THE GETTY RESEARCH INSTITUTE LIBRARY Halsted VanderPoel Campanian Collection COMMITTEE The Right Hon. LORD BROUGHAM, F.R.S., Member of the Nuiocft) Institute of France. Vice-Chairman .—JOHN WOOD, fisq. IVea«urer.—WILLIAM TOOKE, Esq^ M.P., F.R.S. W. Allen, Esq., F.R. and R.A.S. Capt. F. Beaufort, R.N., F.R. and R.A.S., Hydrographer to the Admiralty. G. Burrows, M.D. Peter Stafford Carey, Esq. M'illiam Coulson, E&q. R. D. Craig, Esq. William Crawford, Esq. J. Frederick Daniell, Esq., F.R.S. J. F. Davis, Esq., F.R.S. H. T. De la Beche, Esq., F.R.S. &c. The Rt. Hon. Lord Denman. The Right Rev. the Bishop of Durham, D.D. The lit. Hon. Vise. Ebrin^on, M.P. Sir Henry Ellis, F.R.S.,Prin. Lib. Brit. Mus. T. F. Ellis, Esq., A.M., F.R.A.S. John Elliotson, M.D., F.R.S. Thomas Falconer, Esq. I. L. (Joldsmid, Esq , F.R., and R.A.S. B. Goinpertz. Esq., F.R., and R.A.S. G. B. (ireenough. Esq., F.R., and L.S. H. Hallam, E.sq., F.R.S., A.M. M. I). Hill, Esq. Howland Mill, Esq., F.R.A.S. Edwin Hill, Esq. The Rt. Mon. Sir J.C. Hobhouse,Bart,M.P. David Jardine, Esq., A.M. Henry B. Ker, Esq. The Rt. Hon. iTie Earl ol Kerry. Thos. Hewitt Key, Esq., M.A. J. T. Leader, Esq., M.P. George C. Lewis, Esq., M.A. Thomas Henry Lister, Esq. James Loch, Esq., M.P., F.G.S. George Long, Esq., M.A. J. W. Lubbock, Esq., F..R., R.A., and L.S.S. H. Malden, Esq., M.A. A. T. Malkin, Esq., M.A. James Manning, Esq. J. Herman Merivale, Esq., M.A.« F.A.S, James Mill, Esq. The Right Hon. Lord Nugent. W. H. Old, Esq., M.P. The Right Hon, Sir H.Parnell, Bt> M.P, Dr. Roget,Sec. R.S., F.R.A.S. Edw. Komilly, Esq. Right Hon. Lord J. Russell, M.P SirM. A. Shee, P.R.A., F.R.S. John Abel Smith, Esq., ;V1 .P. The Right Hon. Earl Spencer. John Taylor, Esq., F.R.S. Dr. A. T Thompson, F.L.S. H. Waymouth, Esq. J. Whishaw, Esq., M.A . F.R.S. John Wrottesley, Esq.. M.A., F.R.A S. THOMAS COATES, Esq., Secretary, No. 5&, Lincoln’s Inn Fields. PUKLlSliZD Vi^OEk THK SVPERINTEkDENCE OF THE SOCIBTf FOR THE DIFFUSION OF USEFUL KNOWLEDGE. THE LIBRARY OK ENTERTAINING KNOWLEDGE. POMPEII. VOL. II COMMITTEE CA^rman *—The Right Hon. LORD BROUGHAM, F.R.S., Member uf the Institute of France. Vice-Chairman .—JOHN WOOD, Esq. IVeaiuren—WILLIAM TOOKE, Esq^ M.P., F.R.S. W. Allen, Esq., F.R. and R.A.S. Capt. F. Beaufort, R.N , F.R. and R.A.S., Hydrographer to the Admiralty. G. Burrows, M.D. Peter Stafford Carey, Esq. M'illiam Coulson, Esq. R. D. Craig, Esq. William Crawford, Esq. J. Frederick Daniell, Esq., F.R.S. J. F. Davis, E.sq., F.R.S. H. T. I)e la Beche, Esq., F.R.S. &c. The Rt. Hon. Lord Denman. The Right Rev. the Bishop of Durham, D.D. The Kt. Hon. Vise. Ebrin^on, M.P. Sir Henry Ellis, F.R.S.,Prm. Lib. Brit. Mus. T. F. Ellis, Esq., A.M., F.R.A.S. John Elliotson, M.D., F.R.S. Thomas Falconer, Esq. I. L. (joldsmid, Esq_, F.R., and R.A.S. B. Goinpertz. Esq., F.U., and R.A.S. G. B. (ireenough. Esq., F.R., and L.S. H. Hallam, Esq., F.R.S., A.M. M. D. Hill, Esq. Howland Hill, Esq., F.R.A.S. Edwin Hill, Esq. The Rt. Hon. Sir J.C. Hobhouse,Bart.,M.P. David Jardine, Esq., A.M. Henry B. Ker, Esq. The Rt. Hon. the Earl oi Kerry. Thos. Hewitt Key, Esq., M.A. J. T. Leader, Esq , M.P. George C. Lewis, Esq.. M.A. Thomas Henry Lister, Esq. James Loch, Esq., M.P., F.G.S. George Long, Esq., M.A. J. W. Lubbock, Esq., F«.R., R.A., and L.S.S. H. Malden, Esq., M.A. A. T. Malkin, Esq., M.A. James Manning, Esq. J. Herman Merivale, Esq., M.A., P.A.S. James Mill, Esq. The Right Hon. Lord Nugent. W. H. Old, Esq., M.P. The Right Hon. Sir H, Parnell, Bt., M.P. Dr. Roget,Sec. R.S., F.R.A.S. Edw. Romilly, Esq. Right Hon. Lord J. Russell, M.P SirM. A. Shee, P.K.A., F.R.S. John Abel Smith, Esq., M .P. The Right Hon. Earl Spencer. John Taylor, Esq., F.R.S. Dr. A. T 'I’hompson, F.L.S. H. Way mouth, Esq. J. Whishaw, Esq., M.A . F.R.S. John Wrottesley, Esq.. iM.A., F.RAl S« THOMAS COATES, Esq., Secretary, No. 5d, Lincoln's Inn Fields. THE LIBRARY OF ENTERTAINING KNOWLEDGE. POMPEII. VOLUME II. FOURTH EDITION, LONDON: CHARLES KNIGHT & Co., 22, LUDGATE-STREET. LONGMAN, REKS, ORME, BROWN, & GREEN, PATERNOSTER-ROW ; OLIVER & BOTD, EDINBURGH ; ATKINSON & CO., GLASGOW ; WAKEMAN, DUBLIN; WILMER & SMITH, LIVERPOOL; AND BAINES & NEWSOME. LEEDS. MDCCCXXXVI :london : Printed by William Clowes and Sons, Stamford Street. THE GETTY CENTER LIBRARY CONTENTS CHAPTER I. Domestic Architecture of Italy . , CHAPTER II. Paintings and Mosaics CHAPTER III. Streets and Fountains CHAPTER IV. Private Houses .... CHAPTER V. Houses of Pansa and Sallust CHAPTER VI. Street of Herculaneum CHAPTER VII. Art of Baking—Fullonica .... CHAPTER VIII. House of the Tragic Poet ..... CHAPTER IX. Houses of the Qusestor, Meleager, and the Nereids . CHAPTER X. Survey of the Remainder of the City . P»gt 1 . 37 . 64 . 79 . 98 . 124 . 134 . 150 . 178 . 210 vi CONTENTS. Suburban Villa Pas’e CHAPTER XI. • • • . . . . 221 Tombs . CHAPTER XH. CHAPTER XIH. Domestic Utensils 281 ILLUSTRATIONS, engravings on steel. Restoration of the Roman Forum . . to face the Tide View of the Villa of M. An-ius Diomedes . . .235 Bronze Lamps and Vases .... 297 Painting on the Walls of the Pantheon . . . . 315 engravings on wood. No. 1. Ionic Capital .... I 2 . Cabin of the Aboriginal Latians .... 3 3. Dancing Fauns, from the decorated Walls of Pompeii . 13 4 . Fragment of a Plan of Rome, engraved on Marble . 20 5. Ancient Bolt, Key, Hinge, and Door Handles . . 22 6 . Door of a Private Dwelling restored . . 23 7. Ornamental Drinking Glasses, cast in a mould . , 31 8 . Doric Capital, cut in Tufa, and covered with coloured Stucco ; the stucco having partially fallen, the carving beneath is shown ...... 36 9. Biga, from the Arabesques ..... 37 10 . Mosaic Picture, by Dioscorides of Samos . . 41 11. A Female painting a Picture of the Bearded Bacchus . 60 12. Studio of a Painter of Antiquity .... 62 13. Curule Chair, from a Picture in Pompeii ... 63 14 . Helmet, Sword, and Scale Armour, made ol Bone . 64 15. One of the Windows of the House of the Tragic Poet . 65 16. View of the Street of the Mercuries . , .66 17 . View of a Sewer in the City of Pompeii . . , >69 ILLUSTRATIONS. Pagt 71 viii No. 18. Bas-relief of a Goat over a Milk-Shop . 19. Section of one of the numerous public Fountains dis¬ covered in the Streets of Pompeii . . 20. Jet d’eau, from the Arabesque Paintings of Pompeii . 21. Curule Seat discovered in Herculaneum. 22. Bee-hives and Cover, made of Bronze 23. Ground-plan of a Shop . . . • • 24. View of a Btook-shop restored , . . • 25. Street View near the Baths ..... 26. Ground-plan of a Shop . . . • 27. Ground-pJan of a small House .... 28. Bed and Table, from a Painting .... 29. Plan of a Triclinium, showing the disposition of the Guests ....... 30. Picture representing a Domestic Supper Party . 31. Grotind-plan of a small House . . • 32. Painting representing Circe and Ulysses . 33. Plan of the House of Queen Caroline 34. Mercury, from a Painting ..... 35. Dancing Faun ....*•• 36. Plan of the House of Pansa. 37. View of the Entrance to the House of Pansa 38. A Religious Painting in the Kitchen of the House of Pansa ......•• 39. Stove in the Kitchen of the House of Pansa 40. A flat Ladle, called Trua ..... 41 . Atrium of the House of Pansa . . . . 42. Ground-plan of the House of Sallust 43. View of the Entrance to the House of Sallust . 44. Summer Triclinium in the small Garden of the House of Sallust 45. Venereum of the House of Sallust .... 46 . Atrium of the House of Sallust .... 75 76 78 79 81 82 83 84 86 87 89 89 91 92 95 97 98 99 103 105 106 107 108 109 111 117 119 120 ILLUSTRATIONS. ix No. Page. 47. Staircase, Stove, and Water-closet, in the Venereum of the House of Sallust ... . I'il 48. Part of the Cornice of the Impluvium of the Atrium of the House of Sallust. ..... 122 49. Painting, representing the manner of hanging a Picture against the Wall . , . . . ,123 50. Mosaic Pavement ...... 124 51. Female Figure with Papyri ..... 129 52. Figure playing on the Harp, Figure reading a Roll ol Papyrus ....... 130 53. Figure from the House of the Female Dancers . . 132 54. Dancing Faun ....... 133 55. Antique bas-relief in terra-cotta, representing a Mule attached to a Mill ...... 134 56. View of the Baker’s Shop and Mill . . . 136 57. Section of the Mill ..... 138 58. Painting in the Ba-kehouse ..... 141 59. Bread discovered in Pompeii .... 143 60. Fullers at Work, from a Painting in the Fullonica . 145 61. Carding a Tunic, from a Painting in the Fullonica . 147 62. Clothes-press, from a Painting in the Fullonrca . 148 63. Vignette, Figure of Penelope, from the Walls of the Pantheon ....... 149 64. Small Painting in the Tragic Poet’s House . . 150 65. Island, including the Tragic Poet’s House, the Fullonica, and the Great and Small Fountains . . . 151 66. Mosaic at the Entrance of the Prothyrum of the Tragic Poet’s House ........ 153 67. Achilles delivering Briseis to the Heralds. . . 156 68. Head of Achilles ...... 158 69. Side of a Wall of a small Apartment in the Tragic Poet’s House ....... 161 70. Female and Cupid fishing . . . , .164 X ILLUSTRATIONS. No. 71. The Sacrifice of Iphigenia . . . . .165 72. Leda and Tyndareus ...■•• ^67 73. Centaurs painted on a black ground in the Triclinium of the Tragic Poet’s House • . • .168 74. House of the Tragic Poet, as restored by S;r William Cell. . . 169 75. Atrium of the House of Ceres, from ‘ Pompeiana’ . 171 76. Painting of Jupiter from the House of Ceres . . 173 77. House of Great Fountain, from ‘ Pompeiana’ . .174 78. Cupid milking a Goat . . . . • .175 79. Farm-yard Scene . . • • • .176 80. Painting in the House of the Tragic Poet . . 177 81. Curricle Bar, from a Picture in Pompeii . . 178 82. Rustic Work and Cornices, from the House of the Quaestor 1®® 83. Atrium of the House of the Quaestor . . . ^33 84. Thetis dipping Achilles in the Styx . . .188 85. Court of the Piscina of the House of the Quaestor , 189 86. Perseus and Andromeda ..... 190 87. Medea meditating the Murder of her Children . . 190 88. Thermopoiium . . • • • • .193 89. Drinking Scene 90. Meleager returned from hunting . • . .197 91. Ground.plan of the House of the Nereids . • 200 92. Marble Vase, P’ountain, and Marble Table, in the Atrium of the House of the Nereids . • .201 93. Capital from House of Nereids . . • • 20b 94. Section of the House of the Nereids . • • 209 95. Elevation of part of the Street of Tombs . . 209 96. Bacchus, from a Painting . . . . • 212 97. Stone Doorway in the Street of the Silversmiths . 214 98. Ground-plan of the House of Joseph II. . i • 217 ILLUSTRATIONS. XI No. Page 99. Tetraslyle Atrium of a House excavated by General Championet . . . . . .219 100. Portico of the House of Diomedes, with a view of the Atrium beyond . . . . . .221 101. Ground-plan of the Suburban Villa of Diomedes . 225 102. Bronze Vase ....... 244 103. Funeral Column ...... 257 104. Ground-plan of the Street of Tombs . . . 258 105. Gate of Herculaneum. » . . . • 259 106. Interior of the Tomb with the Marble Door . . 262 107. View of the Funeral Triclinium .... 264 108. Bas-relief of Nsevoleia Tyche . . . . 267 109. Bas-relief on the Monument of Naevoleia Tyche . 268 110. Bas-relief on the Tomb of Naevoleia Tyche . . 269 111. Bisellium ....... 271 112. View of the Tomb of Scaurus, the Round Tomb, and the Tomb of Calventius Quietus . . . 272 113. Bas-relief on a Pinnacle of the Wall enclosing the Circular Tomh ...... 273 114. Section of the Circular Tomb .... 274 115. Semicircular Exedra in the Street of Tombs . . 275 116. Gold Ring •....,. 276 117. Geometrical elevation of the Tomb of Mamia restored 277 118. From a Painting ...... 280 119. Money-bag and Coins . . . . .281 120. Papyri and Tabulae.282 121. Tabulae, Calamus, and Papyrus .... 283 122. Tabulae, Stylus, and Papyrus .... 284 123. Tabulae and Calamus |. . . . . 285 124. Scrinium and Capsa ..... 286 125. Calendar ....... 287 126. Elevation of a Bronze Lantern .... 290 I LLUSTRATIONJ'. xii No. 127. Section ol a Bronze Lantern .... *292 128. Upright of ditto ...... 293 129. Extinguisher ....... 130. Candelabra ....... 295 131. Bronze Figure inlaid with Embletic Work . . 299 132. Candelabrum . . . . . • .301 133. Moveable Tripod ...... 302 134. Brazier.303 135. Kitchen Utensils ...... 304 136. Brazier 305 137. Bronze Vase ....... 306 138. Simpula ....... ibid. 139. Kitchen Utensils of Bronze .... 307 140. Terra-cotta Vase ...... 308 141. Drinking Cup ...... 309 142. Grotesque Vases ...... 310 143. Liquor-basket of Clay, with Glass Vessels . .311 144. Glass Vessels ....... 312 145. Bronze Strainer .... . . ibid. 146. Draped Female Statue discovered in Herculaneum . 314 147. Figure dressed in the Tunico-pallium . . . 316 148. Tunico-pallium displayed ..... 317 149. Harp-player ....... 319 150. Harp-player using the Plectrum .... 320 151. Scipio, Masinissa, and Sophonisba . . . 321 152. Ear-rings, Gold Pin, and Ring . . . . 32.3 153. Combs ........ ibid. 154. Mirrors, &c. ....... 324 d POMPEII Chapter I. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. The first volume having been employed in de* scribing the public buildings which are preserved in Pompeii, the second will contain an account ot the most remarkable houses which have been dis¬ interred ; of the paintings, domestic utensils, and other articles found in them; and such information upon the domestic manners of the ancient Italians as may seem requisite to the illustration of these * Ionic capital, from Pompeii, witn angular volutes. The order partakes much of the Doric ; being without a base, ana having the shaft sharply terminated. Four similar capitals are to be seen at the four angles of the Greco-Siculan sepulchral monument at Girgenti, commonly called the Sepulchre of the Horse. VOL. II. B 2 POMPEir. remains. This branch of our subject is not less inte¬ resting, nor less extensive than the other. Temples and theatres, in equal preservation, and of greater splendour than those at Pompeii, may be seen in many places: but towards acquainting us vrith the habitations, the private luxuries and elegancies of ancient life, not all the scattered fragments of do¬ mestic architecture which exist elsewhere have done so much as this city, with its fellow-sufferer, H er- culaneum. But as these ancient houses differ very- much from any now in use, and as we shall have continual occasion to use the terms by which Vitru¬ vius, and, after him, modern architects, have named their several apartments, it will be useful to preface our descriptions by a short account of the steps by which the Romans advanced from huts to palaces, as the residences of the more wealthy individuals among them may be termed, and of the distribution and purposes of the rooms, for a general resem¬ blance is to be found in the ground-plan of all of them. We shall also give an explanation of those architectural terms which we shall have occasion most frequently to employ. If we ascend to the earliest period of Roman story, and mention the thatched cottage of Romulus, reli¬ giously preserved in the Capitol, and repaired from time to time with the same rude materials of which it was originally built, it is not with the purpose of drawing any inference with respect to the domestic architecture of that remote and fabulous time, or of fatiguing the reader by tracing the progress of this art from the cottage of Romulus to the golden house of Nero. But there is a singularly interesting relic of antiquity preserved by Mazois, which this mention of the founder of Rome may serve to introduce to our notice. Some time since, a quantity of cinerary vases were discovered in the neighbourhood of Alba, domestic architecture of ITALY. 3 which, on that eminent architect’s authority*, “ belong unquestionably to the first inhabitants of Latium, and ascend beyond the earliest known epochs of Italian history, since the spot in which they were found is entirely covered with thick beds of lava which have flowed from Monte Albano, a volcano of whose eruptions all memory is lost in the night of antiquity.” That which makes these urns most curious, is, that they represent the rude habitations of the time ; and granting that they are genuine, of which Mazois expresses no doubt, the nature of these representations is sutficient warranty of their high antiquity. Here, probably, we see the cabins of the Cabin of lUe Abongmal Latians. aboriginal Latians ; and such, we may conjecture, was the cottage so long preserved with re.igious veneration in the Capitol. -t i iu To the reign of the first Tarquin is ascribed the introduction of the Etruscan style of architecture, as well in the arrangement of houses, as m the magnificent public works, the walls, sewers, and Forum, which are said to have been built by mm. But, to pass hastily over this doubtful ground, it is enough to state that we have authority for giving * Tart ii. p. 5. 4 POMPEII. an Etruscan origin to the principal divisions of the Roman houses*. These in the early ages were poor and mean. For the first five hundred years of the city, the use of tiles was unknown, thatch or shingles forming the materials of roofs; and a story is told that the consul Publicola, having built a house of such splendour, according to the notions of the age, as to excite the jealousy of the people, demolished it in a single night in hope of regaining his popularity; conclusive proof against the solidity, at least, of the building. Excessive expense was guarded against by sumptuary laws ; and it was forbidden to build walls exceeding about a foot and a half in thickness. This restriction, with the weak nature of the materials employed in early times, at first unbaked bricks, then wooden frame-work filled up with masonry, limited the height of houses to one story, as we are told by Vitruvius ; and even after baked bricks were known, their size, which exceeded the size of those now in uset, rendered it difficult to break the joints, and bond the walls sufficiently for lofty erec¬ tions. As population increased, and with it the value of ground in the city, economy of room was sought in added height, and the increased skill of the architect found means to raise houses of several stories. They were then surmounted by a terrace named solarium, from sol, the sun, whose genial warmth the inhabitants enjoyed there in the winter: while in the summer they frequented it for the sake of the cool evening breeze, and the magnificent prospects of the city and its environs. Here the Romans loved to take their evening repast, and * Varro and Festus, quoted by Mazois, part ii. p. 7. f They were a foot and a half long, and a foot broad. This being the case the wall would only have been one brick thick, and liable to open at any of the joints. We give solidity to walls which are no thicker, by interweaving the bricks so that no Joint may run through.—Vitruv. ii 3, 8. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. 5 hence the upper story received the name of ceenacu- lum, the supper-room. At last houses reached such an extreme height, that Augustus forbad a greater elevation than seventy feet to be given them. Towards the last years of the republic, the Romans naturalized the arts of Greece among themselves; and Grecian architecture came into fashion at Rome, as we may learn, among other sources, from the letters of Cicero to Atticus, which bear constant testimony to the strong interest which he took in ornamenting his several houses, and mention Cyrus, his Greek architect. At this time immense fortunes were easily made from the spoils of new conquests, or by peculation and maladministration of subject provinces, and the money thus ill and easily acquired was squandered in the most lavish luxury. One favourite mode of indulgence was in splendour of building. Lucius Cassius was the first who orna¬ mented his house with columns of foreign marble: they were only six in number, and twelve feet high. He was soon surpassed by Scaurus, who placed in his house columns of the black marble called Lu¬ cullian, thirty-eight feet high, and of such vast and unusual weight, that the superintendent ot sewers, as we are told by Pliny*, took security for any injury which might happen to the works under his charge, before they were suffered to be conveyed along the streets. Another prodigal, by name Mamurra, set the example of lining his rooms with slabs of marble. The best estimate, however, of the growth of architectural luxury about this time may be found in what we are told by Pliny, that, in the year of Rome 676, the house of Lepidus was the finest in the city, and thirty-five years later it was not the hundredthf. We may mention, as an ex¬ ample of the lavish expenditure of the Romans, Nat. Hist, xxxvi. 2. f lb. yxr.vi 15, B 3 6 POMPEII. that Domitius Ahenobarbus offered for the house of Crassus a sum amounting to near ^£48,500, which was refused by the owner*. Nor were they less ex¬ travagant in their country houses. We may again quote Cicero, whose attachment to his Tusculan and Formian villas, and interest in ornamenting them, even in the most perilous times, is well known. Still more celebrated are the villas of Lucullus and Pollio; of the latter some remains are still to be seen near Pausilipo. Augustus endeavoured by his example to check this extravao ant passion, but tie produced little effect. And in the palaces of the emperors, and especially the Aurea Domus, the Golden House ot INero, the domestic architecture of Rome, or, we might probably say, of the world, reached its extreme point of mag¬ nificence. But these wonders do not belong to our pa^es ^ and to dwell on them would but discredit the edifices which it is our province to describe, spacious in tliemselves and sumptuous, yet mean in comparison with those of which we have just spoken. We therefore proceed to offer to the reader a sketch of the arrangement of a Roman house of the better class. This arrangement, though varied, of course, by local circumstances, and according to the rank and circumstances of the master, was pretty generally the same in all. The principal rooms, differing only in size and ornament, recur everywhere ; those supplemental ones, which were invented only for convenience or luxury, vary according to the tastes and circumstances of the master. Vitruvius directs our attention to one principle of distribution, strange to modern habits, but of importance towards understanding the construction of a Roman house ; that every considerable mansion * SeJ.agies sestertium.—Plin. Hist. Nat. xvii.l. DOMESTIC architecture OF ITALY. 7 mio-ht be divided into two parts, one intended for public resort, the other destined for the private service of the family. The origin of this may be found in the constitution of Rome, by which every plebeian might choose from among the patricians a patron, whose client he became, and to whose house he resorted freely for advice or assistance. To have a large body of clients was esteemed both honourable and advantageous, as the patron might of course reckon on their votes and support in all civil matters. With this view, lawyers of eminence gave free access to all who wished to consult them: and generally by day-break, or before it, the vestibules and ante-rooms of persons of any eminence, but especially those who were distinguished by wealth or political power, were filled with a crowd, each coming with some par¬ ticular object, one to recommend himself by the regularity of his attendance, another to request some favour, another from a wish to display his intimacy with the rich and powerful owner, others to receive the dole of meat or money which was distributed to needy retainers*. This crowd was of course received in the outer rooms, so as to affect as little as possible the privacy of the mansion. These rooms, which constituted what Vitruvius calls the public part, were the portico, vestibule, caveedium or atrium, tablinum, alee, fauces, and others less important, added at the will of the owner or architect. The private part comprised the peristyle, bed¬ chambers, triclinium, oeci, picture-gallery, library, baths, exedra, xystus, &c. We proceed to explain the meaning of these terms. Before great mansions there was generally a court, or area, upon which the portico opened, either sur- *-Sportula primo Limine parva sedet, turbae rapienda togatse.- .Ju>. i. Jio See also Cic. ad Alt. v. 2, and the SatirisU, pas.iim 8 POMPEII. rounding three sides of the area, or merely running along the front of the house. In smaller houses the portico ranged even with the street. Within the portico, or if there were no portico, opening directly to the street, was the vestibule, consisting of one or more spacious apartments. It was considered to be without the house, and was always open for the reception of those who came to wait there until the doors should be opened. The prothyrum, in Greek architecture, was the same as the vestibule. In Roman architecture, it was a passage-room, between the outer or house-door which opened to the vestibule , and an inner door which closed the entrance of the atrium. In the vestibule, or in an apartment open¬ ing upon it, the porter, ostiarius, usually had his seat. The atrium, or cavajdium, for they appear to have signified the same thing*, was the most im¬ portant, and usually the most splendid apartment of the house. Here the owner received his crowd of morning visitors, who were not admitted to the inner apartments. The term is thus explained by Varro: “ The hollow of the house (cavum aedium) is a covered place within the walls, left open to the common use of all. It is called Tuscan, from the * Some commentators on Vitruvius, and among them Mr. Wil¬ kins, deny this. The term cavaediuin is certainly equally appli¬ cable to any other open court, as, for instance, to the peristyle; and Pliny, in the account of his Laurentine villa, makes menti’ "> of both atrium and cavaedium, and speaks also of the peristyle. ... wonder that much obscurity and difference of opinion prevails on these subjects, since almost all our knowledge is derived from the scanty account of Vitruvius ; and it is obvious that whatever general rules might be recognized by architects, they must have been modified in innumerable instances by the caprice or con¬ venience of individuals. It is dangerous, therefore, to attempt to wrest the text of an author, to make it square with some speci¬ men which has been preserved or described; for we can never be sure that the two were even meant to coincide. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. 9 Tuscans, after the Romans began to imitate their cavtodiuin. The word atrium is derived fiom the Atriates, a people of Tuscany, from whom the pattern of it was taken*.” Originally, then, the atrium was the common room of resort for the whole family, the place of their domestic occupations ; and such it probably continued in the humbler ranks of life. A general description of it may easily be given. It was a large apartment, roofed over, but with an opening in the centre, called compluvium , towards which the roof sloped, so as to throw the rain-water into a cistern in the floor called impluviuTTi. truvius, however, distinguishes five species of atria. 1. The Tuscanicum, or Tuscan atrium, the oldest and siniplest of all. It was merely an apartment, the roof of which was supported by four beams crossing each other at right angles, the included space forming the compluvium. Many of these remain at Pompeii. 2. The tetrastyle, or four-pillared atrium, re¬ sembled the Tuscan, except that the girders, or main beams of the roof, were supported by pillars, placed at the four angles of the impluvium. This furnished means of increasing the size of the apartment. 3. The Corinthian atrium differed from the te¬ trastyle only in the number of pillars and size of the impluvium. A greater proportion of the root seems to have been left open. 4. The atrium displuviatum had its roof inclined the contrary way, so as to throw the water off to the outside of the house, instead of carrying it into the impluvium. 5. The atrium testudinatum was roofed all over, without any vacancy or compluvium. * De ling. Lat. lib. iv. u i ■j- F'rom con and pluvia, because the rain-water was brought together there The deriva'ion of impluvium is equally obvious. 10 POMPEII. The roof around the compluvium was edged with a row of highly ornamented tiles, called antefixes, on which a mask or some other figure was moulded. At the corners there were usually spouts, in the form of lions’ or dogs’ heads, or any fantastical device which the architect might fancy, which carried the rain¬ water clear out into the impluviurn, whence it passed into cisterns ; from which again it was drawn for household purposes. For drinking, river-water, and still more well-water, was preferred. Often the atrium was adorned with fountains, supplied through leaden or earthenware pipes, from aqueducts or other raised heads of water; for the Romans knew the property of fluids, which caused them to stand at the same height in communicating vessels. This is distinctly recognized by Pliny*, though their common use of aqueducts, in preference to pipes, has led to a supposition that this great hydrostatical principle was unknown to them. The breadth of the impluviurn, according to Vitruvius, was not less than a quarter, nor greater than a third, of the whole breadth of the atrium ; its length was regulated by the same stan¬ dard. The opening above it was often shaded by a coloured veil, which diffused a softened light, and moderated the intense heat of an Italian sun f- The splendid columns of Scaurus, which we have already mentioned, were placed, as we learn from Pliny, in the atrium of his house. The walls were painted with landscapes or arabesques—a practice introduced about the time of Augustus,—or lined with slabs of foreign and costly marbles, of which the Romans * Nat. Hist. xxxi. 6, sect. 31; Aqua in plumbo subit altitudi- nem exortus sui. ■j" Rubent (vela sell.) in cavis eedium, et museum a sole defen¬ dant. We may conclude, then, that the impluviurn was some¬ times ornamented with moss or flowers, unless the words cavis aedium may be extended to the court of the peristyle, which was commonly laid out as a garden. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. 11 were passionately fond. The pavement was com- r»osed of the same precious material, or of still more valuable mosaics. The tablinum was an appendage of the atrium, and usually entirely open to it. It contained, as its name imports*, the family archives, the statues, pictures, genealogical tables, and other relics of a long line of ancestors. Alse, wings, were similar but smaller apartments or recesses on the right and left sides of the atrium. Fauces, jaws, were passages, more especially those which passed to the interior of the house from the atrium. Thus Virgil uses the word, not merely in a metaphorical sense:— *■ Vestibulum ante ipsum, printiisq: in faucibus Orci.” ^n. vi. 273. In houses of small extent, strangers were lodged in chambers which surrounded and opened into the atrium. The great, whose connexions spread into the provinces, and who were visited by numbers who, on coming to Rome, expected to profit by their hospitality, had usually a hospitium, or place of reception for strangers, separate, or among the de¬ pendencies of their palaces. Of the private apartments the first to be men¬ tioned is the peristyle, which usually lay within the atrium, and communicated with it both through the tablinum and by fauces. In its general plan it re¬ sembled the atrium, being in fact a court, open to the sky in the middle, and surrounded by a colon¬ nade, but it was larger in its dimensions, and the centre court was often decorated with shrubs and flowers, and was then called xysius. It should be greater in extent when measured transversely than in length, and the intercolumniations should not * From tabula, or tabella, a picture. Another derivation is, “ quasi e tabulis compactum,” because the large openings into it might be closed by shutters. 12 POMPEII. exceed four, nor fall short of three diameters of the columns. Of the arrangement of the bed-chambers we know little. They seem tc have been small and incon¬ venient. \Vhen there was room they had usually a procoeton, or ante-chamber. Vitruvius recommends that they should face the east, for the benefit of the early sun. One of the most important apartments in the whole house was the triclinium, or dining¬ room, so named from the three beds, rpetv /c\tVat, which encompassed the table on three sides, leaving the fourth open to the attendants. The prodigality of the Romans in matters of eating is well known, and it extended to all matters connected with the pleasures of the table. In their rooms, their couches, and all the furniture of their entertainments, magnifi¬ cence and extravagance were carried to their highest point. The rich had several of these apartments, to be used at different seasons, or on various occasions. Lucullus, celebrated for his wealth and profuse expen¬ diture, had a certain standard of expenditure for each triclinium, so that when his servants knew which hall he was to sup in, they knew exactly the style of entertainment to be prepared ; and there is a well- known story of the way in which he deceived Pompey and Cicero, when they insisted on going home with him to see his family supper, by merely sending word home that he would sup in the Apollo, one of the most splendid of his halls, in which he never gave an entertainment for less than 50,000 denarii, about ^£'1600. Sometimes the ceiling was contrived to open and let down a second course of meats, with showers of flowers and perfumed waters, while rope- dancers performed their evolutions over the heads of the company. The performances of these funam- buli are frequently represented in paintings at Pompeii. Those in the opposite plate have the characteristics of fauns, or, according to Lord Mon- DOMESTIC ARl'HlTECTURE OF ITALY. 13 Dancing Fauns. From the decorated walls of Pompeii. Mazois, in his work entitled ' Le Palais de Scaurus, has given a fancy picture of the habitation of a Roman noble of the highest class, in which he has embodied all the scattered notices of domestic life, which a diligent perusal of the Latin writers has enabled him to collect. His description of the VOL. n. c 14 POMPEII. triclinium of Scaurus will give the reader the best notion of the style in which such an apartment was furnished and ornamented. For each particular in the description he quotes some authority; we shall not, however, encumber our pages with references to a long list of books not likely to be in the possession of most readers. “ The triclinium is twice as long as it is broad, and divided, as it were, into two parts—the upper occupied by the table and the couches, the lower left empty for the convenience of the attendants and spectators. Around the former the walls, up to a certain height, are ornamented with valuable hang¬ ings*. The decorations of the rest of the room are noble, and yet appropriate to its destination ; gar¬ lands, entwined with ivy and vine-branches, divide the walls into compartments, bordered with fanciful ornaments ; in the centre of each of which are painted with admirable elegance young fauns, or half-naked bacchantes, carrying thyrsi, vases, and all the furniture of festive meetings. Above the columns is a large frieze, divided into twelve compartments; each of these is surmounted by one of the signs of the Zodiac, and contains paintings of the meats which are in highest season in each month ; so that under Sagittary (December), we see shrimps, shell-fish, and birds of passage; under Capricorn (January), lob¬ sters, sea-fish, wild boar, and game; under Aquarius (February), ducks, plovers, pigeons, water-rails, &c. “ Bronze lampsf, dependent from chains of the ■ * It was the fall of such hangings that created such confusion at Nasidienus’ supper. “Interea suspensa graves aulaea ruinas In patinam fecere ; trahentia pulveris atri Quantunn non Aquilo Campanis excitat agris.” Hor. Sat. ii. 8, 54. f The best of these were made at jEgina. The more common ones cost from £20 to £25; some fetched as much as £400.—• Pliii. Hist. Nat. xxxiv. 3. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. 15 same metal, or raised on richly wrought candelabra, threw around the room a brilliant light. Slaves, set apart for this service, watched them, trimmed the wicks, and from time to time supplied them with oil. “ The table, made of citron wood* from the ex¬ tremity of Mauritania, more precious than gold, rested upon ivory feet, and was covered by a plateau of massive silver, chased and carved, weighing five hundred pounds. The couches, which would contain thirty persons, were made of bronze, overlaid with ornaments in silver, gold, and tortoise-shell ; the mattresses of Gallic wool, dyed purple; the valuable cushions, stuffed with feathers, were covered with stuffs woven and embroidered with silk mixed with threads of gold. Chrysippus told us that they were made at Babylon, and had cost four millions of ses¬ terces f. “ The mosaic pavement, by a singular caprice of the architect, represented all the fragments of a feast, as if they had fallen in common course on the floor; so that at the first glance the room seemed not to have been swept since the last meal, and it was called from hence aadpioTo^ 6 iko9, the unswept saloon. At the bottom of the hall were set out vases of Corinthian brass. This triclinium, the largest of four in the palace of Scaurus, would easily contain a table of sixty covers J ; but he seldom brings to- ♦ These citreae niensae have given rise to considerable dis¬ cussion. Pliny says that they were made of the roots or knots of the wood, and esteemed on account of their veins and markings, which were like a tiger’s skin, or peacock’s tail, (1. 13, xiv.) Some copies read cetfrf for citri; and it has been suggested that the cypress is really meant, the roots and knots of which are large and veined; whereas the citron is never used for cabinet work, and is neither veined nor knotted. t About £32,200. t The common furniture of a triclinium was three couches, placed on three sides of a square table, each containing three per¬ sons, in accordance with the favourite maxim, that a party should 16 POMPEII. gether so large a number of guests, and when on great occasions he entertains four or five hundred persons, it is usually in the atrium. This eating-room is reserved for summer; he has others for spring, autumn, and winter, for the Romans turn the change of season into a source of luxury. His establishment is so appointed that for each triclinium he has a great number of tables of different sorts, and each table has its own service and its particular attendants. “ While waiting for their masters, young slaves strewed over the pavement saw-dust dyed with saffron and vermilion, mixed with a brilliant powder made from the lapis specularis, or talc*.” The reader will not expect to find this magnificent picture realized in the comparatively humble houses of Pompeii; though the triclinia which still exist, bear witness to the elegance of the taste which adorned them. In speaking of these remains, we shall find opportunity to introduce some farther ac¬ count of the Roman banquets. We must now pass Bit to those apartments which are yet undescribed. Q^ci, from 6iko9, a house, were spacious halls, or saloons, borrowed from the Greeks. OEci, like atria, were divided into tetrastyle and Corinthian ; another sort was termed Egyptian. They are directed to have the same proportions as triclinia, but to be made larger, inasmuch as they are ornamented with columns, which triclinia are not. In the Corinthian ceci there was but one row of pillars in height, sup¬ porting the architrave, cornice, and a vaulted roof. The Egyptian were mo-re splendid, and more like basilicse, it is said, than Corinthian triclinia. In them the pillars supported a gallery with paved floor, not consist of more than the Muses nor of fewer than the Graces, not more than nine nor less than three. Where such numbers were entertained, couches must have been placed along the sides of long tables. ’•‘Palais de Scaurus, chap. ix. p.210. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. ]7 open to the sky, forming a walk round the apart¬ ment ; and above this lower range a second range of pillars was placed, a fourth part less in height, which supported the roof. The interstices between the pillars were closed by walls, for windows are directed to be made between them. Another sort of (ECUS, called by the Greeks cyzicene, is said not to have been generally used in Italy ; but some rooms answering to the description have been found at Pom¬ peii. They were meant for summer use, looking to the north, and if possible facing gardens, to which they opened by folding doors. Their length and wi(lth should be such, that two triclinia, or tables with their couches, facing each other, may be placed in them, with ample room for the servants to pass round. Pinacotheca, the picture-gallery, and Bibliotheca, the library, need no explanation. The latter was usually small, as a large number of rolls (volumina) could be contained within a narrow space. Exedra bore a double signification. It Is either a seat, intended to contain a number of persons, like those before the gate of Herculaneum, or a spacious hall, for conversation and the general purposes of society. In the public baths, the word is especially applied to those apartments which were frequented by the philosophers. Of baths, a frequent adjunct to private houses, there is no occasion to say anything more than has been already stated. Xystus was an open space for walking, usually a flower-garden. Such was the arrangement, such the chief apart¬ ments of a Roman house ; they were on the ground* floor, the upper stories being for the most part lefl to the occupation of slaves, freedmen, and the lower branches of the family. We must except, however, the terrace upon the top of all (solarium), a favourite c 3 18 POMPEII. place of resort, often adorned with rare flowers and shrubs, planted in huge cases of earth, and with fountains, and trellices, under which the evening meal might at pleasure be taken. In one house only, recently excavated in Herculaneum, has an upper floor been found in existence: and in that instance, from the carbonization of the wood-work, and the decayed state of the walls, it was necessary to take it down almost immediately. It presented nothing remarkable, consisting of a number of small chambers, of which six opened upon a terrace paved with mosaic, and looking towards the east. 'fhe reader will not, of course, suppose that in all houses all these apartments were to be found, and in the same order. From the confined dwelling of the tradesman to the palace of the patrician, all degrees of accommodation and elegance were to be fonnd. The only object of this long catalogue has been to familiarize the reader with the general type of those objects which we are about to present to him, and to explain at once, and collectively, those terms of art which will be of most frequent occurrence. It may not be uninteresting to subjoin the prin¬ ciples laid down by Vitruvius for giving to each apart¬ ment an aspect appropriate to its use, and his observations on the quality of accommodation which was requisite for the several classes of Roman citizens. “ The winter eating-rooms and winter baths ought,” he says, “ to face the winter west *, for they are to be used in the afternoon, and require both light and heat at that time of the day. Bed-chambers and libraries should fiont the east, an aspect suited for the better preservation of books, for the southern and westerly winds are most laden with moisture, and * “Hyberna triclinia et balnearia occidentem hybernum spec' tent.”—Vit. lib. vi. cap. 7. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. 19 tend to generate damp and moths. The spring and autumn triclinia should also look to the ea^st, the summer triclinium to the north, that the former may enjoy a temj)erate, the latter as cool an atmosphere as can be gained. Picture-galleries and rooms for painting and embroidery should also look to the north, because the colours used in this work retain their brilliancy longer when exposed only to a regular and constant light. “ The next thing to be considered is by what rules we are to be directed in laying out the private parts of houses, and how they should be connected with the public part. For those parts are private, into which strangers enter not, except by invitation, as the chambers, triclinia, baths, and the like. Other parts are common, and any one may enter them uninvited, as the vestibule, cavsedium, peristyle, &c.* To men of ordinary fortune, therefore, magnificent vestibules, and tablina, and atria, are needless, for they attend on others instead of being attended at home. Those who sell their rural produce require shops and stables at the entrances of their houses f. granaries and store¬ houses below, and other arrangements which tend more to use than to beauty. The houses of money¬ lenders, and of those who farm the revenue, should be handsomer and secured from attacks. Lawyers and public speakers require more elegant accommo¬ dation, and rooms that may receive a large assembly. For nobles, who liold the offices and honours of the state, and consequently are exposed to a crowd of suitors, regal vestibules, high halls, and spacious peristyles are necessary, with plantations and exten¬ sive walks, laid out with every attention to magnifi- * This mention of the peristyle seems at variance with the distribution of Mazois, in accordance with whose authority we have above ranked the peristyle among the private apartments. f Several instances of this arrangement are observable at Pompeii. The shops for disposing of the master's produce alwavs communicate with the interior of the house. 20 POMPEII. cence. They should also have libraries, picture-gal¬ leries, and basilicae laid out upon the scale of public buildings, for in their mansions both public business and private suits are often decided*.” There are preserved in the oapitol some curious fragments of a plan of Rome engraved on marble, about the time of Septimius Severus. Mazois refers to them, in proof that the houses at Pompeii are in their origin and disposition Roman houses, and not Grecian, as has been generally supposed, from the Grecian taste which prevails in the architecture and decorations. The constant recurrence of the atrium, which was not found in the Greek houses, leaves in his opinion no doubt upon this subject. We copy one of these fragments, both as a curious relic, and that the reader may have the opportunity of judging for himself of the resemblance in general arrangement between the three grouud-plans contained in it, and those which we shall give hereafter from Pompeii. Fragment of a Pla.i of Rome, engraved on marble. 1. Prothyra, or vestibules; 2. Tuscan atria; 3. Alae, or wings; 4. Fauces; 5. Peristyles; 6. Inner apartments j 7- Shops. * Vitruv. vi. 7, 8. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITaLY. 21 We may here add a few observations, derived, as well as much of the precedin'^ matter, from the valuable work of Mazois, relative to the materials and method of construction of the Pompeian houses. Every species of masonry described by Vitruvius, it is said, may here be met with ; but the cheapest and least durable sorts have been generally preferred, and by far the greater part of the private, and many of the public, edifices are built of bricks, or of the rough masonry called opus incertum *. Hence arises their rapid decay on being exposed to the air. The mor¬ tar also upon which such edifices must entirely de¬ pend for their stability does not possess that remark¬ able hardness which is so often seen in ancient works; a fault attributed by some to the bad quality of its component parts : by others to the baking which it received when enveloped in the heated cin¬ ders. But as the exterior decorative stuccos have received no damage from this cause, it seems more likely that carelessness in the choice of the materials, or in working them together, has produced this bad¬ ness of quality. Copper, iron, lead, have been found employed for the same purposes as those for which we now use them. Iron is more plentiful than copper ,contrary to what is generally observed in ancient works. It is evident from articles of furniture, &c. found in the ruins, that the Italians were highly skilled in the art of working metals, yet they seem to have excelled in ornamental work, rather than in the solid and neat construction of useful articles. For instance, their lock-work is coarse, hardly equal to that which is now executed in the same country ; the external ornaments of doors, bolts, handles, &c. are elegantly wrought. We give specimens of some of these. The key was found in Pompeii, and from its size seems to have been a door-key. The bolt is preserved in the * See vol. i. p. 79. 22 POMPEII. Museum at Naples. The hinge and door-handles, one of which is remarkably rich, are from various authorities. Not a single wooden door has been Door-handles. preserved in Pompeii; the panelling of that which we give as re stored by Mazois, is taken from a mar¬ ble door in the street of tombs, together with the DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY Door of a private dwellitjg restored. 24 POMPEII. ring which served as a handle. Almost all the door¬ ways in Pompeii are nearly of the same size and form, a little more or less care in the execution of capitals and entablatures making all the difference between them. They seem usually to have been bivalve, and to have turned on pivots, not on hinges, and to have been closed by one or two large bolts, such as that above represented, received into the threshold. We may infer from a number of false doors painted on walls, that their colour was generally dark. Their carpentry seems to have been very simple; often beams were not even squared. The carbonized timbers discovered seem to intimate that fir-wood was in most general use. Very little costly decoration is to be found in the houses, with the exception of mosaic pavements, which are numerous and beautiful; even in the pub¬ lic buildings marble is of rare occurrence. Its place, However, was not inadequately filled by a stucco of great beauty, equally adapted to receive paintings, or to be modelled into bas-reliefs. No marble wainscot- ings or columns hewn from single blocks are seen in the atria of Pompeii; but in their place there is a gaiety and capricious elegance, of which but a very inadequate idea can be conveyed by description, aided by the wood engravings which we are able to present. The walls are carefully prepared for the reception of this stucco by several coats of a coarser plaster, made of lime, and the sand called pozzolana. The stucco itself was called alharium, from its whiteness, or opws marmoratum, from its resem¬ blance to marble. It seems to have been made of calcined gypsum, or plaster of Paris, mixed with pulverized, but not calcined stone, and, in the more expensive sort, with powdered marble. Traces left on some unfinished work intimate that it was spread with an instrument resembling that which our plas¬ terers use. A difference in quality, and an economy DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. 25 in the use of it, is observable, which make it proba¬ ble that the expense varied greatly according to the fineness of the material. Not only is the stucco coarser in mean habitations, but where the quality is good in general, it is found coarser in those places which are least exposed to view. An analogous piece of economy is noticed in the account of the baths, vol. i. p. 168. Vitruvius recommends that it should be of considerable thickness; not less, he says, than three coats *. Yet on the columns of the oldest temple in Pompeii, the Greek temple, we see a stucco of extreme beauty, harder than stone, and not more than a line in thickness. The temples at Paestum have received a coat still thinner, and Mazois has expressed an opinion, founded on his personal observation, that the stucco will be found thinner in proportion to the age of the building, and that thick stuccos intimate a late date, and the decline of the art. Ornamental work in relief was formed either by modelling or by stamping with a mould. The latter method was used for cornices, borders, and other works where the same pattern was repeated. The joinings of the moulds are often visible, as in a printed muslin where the ends of the blocks have not been ac¬ curately fitted. We may conjecture that the stucco was dashed in a mass on the wet plaster, the mould forcibly applied, and form and adhesion thus given by a single operation. A bas-relief, or a pattern of uncertain form, was modelled by hand. The work¬ man traced the outline of his design upon the plas¬ ter, and proceeded to fill it up with stucco worked to proper consistency, as our sculptors model a design in clay. But as the plastic matter soon set, and when set was incapable of alteration or ad¬ dition, no small skill was requisite to execute the * vii. 3. VOL. II. D 26 POMPEII. varied designs, of which a number of examples have already been given. The difficulties of this art are nearly the same as those of fresco painting, in which it is well known none but the greatest masters have succeeded. For the common floors a sort of composition was used, resembling probably the compost floors to be seen in Welsh farm-houses and in the north of England. A superior sort was called opus sig- ninum, from Signia, a town celebrated for its tiles. In this case, the plaster basis was thoroughly mixed with pounded tile, which increased its soli¬ dity, and gave it something the appearance of red granite. Sometimes they were inlaid, while soft, with pieces of white marble, set in Grecian frets, and intricate patterns: sometimes the ground is white, and the pattern is made of lozenge-shaped pieces of tile. Grounds of other colours also occur, of which yellow is the most common. Sometimes pieces of marble of all shapes and colours were imbedded in a composition ground, and in these floors the chief aim was to collect the greatest possible variety of marbles. These floors, which Pliny calls barbarica or subtegulanea, appear to have been antecedent to and to have given the first idea of, mosaics, and from the method of their construction is derived their name, pavimentvm, from pavire, to ram down. An intermediate step between these pavements and mosaics occurs in what Pliny calls scalpturatum, which seems to have resembled inlaid work; a pat¬ tern being chiselled out in the solid ground, and filled up with thin leaves of coloured marble. Mo¬ saic floors, as we have said, are frequent in the better class of houses; ariJ will be fully spoken of in the next chapter. A drawing and description of one of the most curious and beautiful has been given, vol. i. p. 245, 6. Marble floors are of rare DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. 27 occurrence, and mostly destroyed, even where we can ascertain their former existence. Of the style and mechanical execution of the paintings which have been found in such numbers, we shall here say nothing. The subject is so in¬ teresting and extensive, that a separate chapter will be necessary even to a brief sketch of it. Numerous preparations of glass, in vases, drink¬ ing-cups, and other utensils, have been found; but the most curious discovery connected with this sub¬ ject is, that in the first century the Romans were incontestably acquainted with the use of glass for windows. The first distinct testimony to this effect is that of Lactantius, about the end of the third century, who speaks of windows fitted with shining glass, or talc*: and as neither Pliny nor Seneca, who both speak of windows, mention their being composed of the former material, a natural conclu¬ sion has been drawn that as yet it had not been applied to that purpose. Pliny’s oinission is the more remarkable, because he speaks at length of the qualities of glass and of the construction of windows. The invention of transparent windows, of whatever materials, is inferred, from a passage of Seneca, not to have been earlier than the Christian eraf. Before this time thin hides, prepared perhaps like parch¬ ment, are mentioned as having been employed, and probably plates of horn, of which Pliny speaks as though they were made into lanterns. Such imper¬ fect contrivances probably were only brought into use when inclement weather rendered some protection necessary: and the poor must have been contented with curtains or shutters. The transparency of talc, and the readiness with which it splits into the thin- * De Opificio Dei, cap. v. Quaedam nostra demum prodiisse memoria scimus, utspecu- iarioruvn usum, perlucente testa, clarum transmittentium lumen. -Ep. 90. 28 POMPEII. nest laminae, natnra.ly suggested to some ingenious person the idea of framing it, and thus at pleasure entirely excluding the air; and hence its name of lapis specular is: for it seems much more reasonable to conclude that specularis is derived from the general term specular, a window, than that whenever the word specular is used, it is to be understood as glazed with the lapis specularis, as some authors have thought. A nother stone employed for the same purpose was called phengites, from (pe^iyos, light. Pliny’s ac¬ count of these two substances runs as follows:— “ As touching laic, it is by nature easy to be cloven into as thin flakes as a man will. This kind of glass stone, the hither part of Spain only in old time did afford us, and the same not all throughout, but within the compass of a hundred miles, namely, about the city Segobrica, but in these we have it from Cyprus, Cappadocia, and Sicily, and of late it has been found in Barbary: howbeit the best glass stone cometh from Spain and Cappadocia, for it is the tenderest, and carrieth the largest panels, al¬ though they be not altogether the clearest, but some¬ what dnskish. There be also of them in Italy, about Bologna • but the same be short and small, full of spots also, and joined to pieces of flint; and yet, it seemeth that in nature they be much like unto those that in Spain be digged out of pits, which they sink to a great dejflh. Moreover, there is found of this talc, enclosed in a rock, and lying under the ground, which must be hewed out if a man would have them. But for the most part it lieth in manner of a vein in the mine by itself, as if it were perfectly cut already by nature ; and yet was there never any piece known to be above five foot long. Some are of opinion that it is a liquid humour of the earth congealed to an ice, after the manner of crystal. Certes, that it groweth hard into the nature ot a stone, may appear evidently by this: that when any wild beasts are DOMESTIC A.RCHITECTURE OF ITALY, 29 chanced to fall into such pits where this glass stone is gotten, the very marrow of their bones (after one winter) will be converted and turned into a stony substance like to the talc itself. Otherwhiles there IS found of this kind which is black: but the white is of a strange and wonderful nature, for being (as it is well known) tender and brittle, nothing more, yet it will endure extreme heats and frozen cold, and never crack; nay, you shall never see it decay for age, keep it so long as you will, so that it may escape outward injuries: notwithstanding we do see many stones in building laid with strong mortar and cement, yet subject to age. There hath been devised also another use of talc, namely, to strew with powder of it the floor of the great circus in Rome, during the running of chariots and other feats of activity there performed, to the end that their whiteness might give a more lovely gloss to commend the place. In the days of Nero, late emperor, there was found in Cap¬ padocia a stone as hard as marble, white and trans¬ parent, even where it is marked with certain tawny streaks or spots: in which regard, for that it is so resplendent, it hath found a name to be called phen- gites. Of this stone, the said emperor caused the Temple of Fortune to be built, called Seia (which King Servius had first dedicated), comprised within the compass of Nero’s golden house ; and therefore when the doors were shut, it was in the interior as light as day ; yet so as if all the light were enclosed within it, and not let in from the air through the windows. Moreover, King Juba writeth, that in Arabia there is a certain stone found, transparent like glass, whereof the inhabitants of those parts do make their mirrors or looking-glasses*.” Pliny speaks of vitreee camercB, glassy chambers, an expression, the exact meaning of which is doubt- ♦ Pliny, translated by Holland, xxxvi. 22. (45, 46.) D 8 30 POMPEII. ful ; but is in general understood to mean rot ms lined or wainscoted with glass. We have met with a passage, vvhich, if the facts contained in it were more certainly related, would go far to decide the question ; and vague as the information is, it is still worth extracting. “ I received a letter from my learned correspondent at Rome, Abate Venuti, dated Dec. 30th, 1759, wherein he informs me that he had lately read in some anecdotes of Cardinal Maximin, ‘ that as they were digging on the ruins on Mount Coelius, in the last century, they found a room be¬ longing to an antique dwelling-house, that had all its sides within ornamented with plates of glass, some of them tinged with various colours, others of their own natural hue, which was dusky, occasioned by the thickness of the mass ofwhich they consisted. There were likewise in the same apartment, window- frames composed of marble, and glazed with lamiuse of glass.’ But as the Abate did not take upon him¬ self to ascertain the real age of this building, I shall not pretend to lay any greater stress on this dis¬ covery than I did on the observation for the sake of which I produced it, for proving the point I had then in view, viz. that the usage of glass for windows was probably nearly of the same antiquity with that of adorning houses with it*.” Whatever authority may be given to this account, there is no doubt but that the Romans possessed glass in sufficient plenty to apply it to purposes of household ornament. The raw material appears from Pliny's account to have undergone two fusions ; the first converted it into a rough mass, called ammonitrum, which was melted again, and became * The curious reader will find this passage, with a more de¬ tailed consideration of the subject, in two papers relative to the antiquity of glass windows, by Mr. Nixon.—Phil. Transact, vol.h p. 601 j lii. 123. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE OF ITALY. 31 pure glass. We are also told of a dark coloured glass resembling obsidian, plentiful enough to be cast into solid statues. Pliny mentions having seen images of Augustus cast in this substance*. It probably was some coarse kind of glass resembling the ammonitrum, or such as that in which the scow'ae of our iron furnaces abound. Glass was worked either by blowing it with a pipe, as is now practised, by turning in a lathe, by engraving and carving it, or, as we have noticed, by casting it in a mould -f. These two glasses, of elegant form. Oriiaiuental driiikii:g-glaiises, cast in a mould. appear to have been formed in the latter way. The ancients had certainly acquired great skill in the manufacture, as appears both from the accounts which have been preserved by ancient autliors, and by the specimens which still exist; among which we may notice as preeminently beautiful, that torment of antiquaries, the Portland vase, preserved in the British Museum. A remarkable story is told by Dion Cassius, of a man who, in the time of the Emperor Tiberius, brought a glass cup into the imperial presence and dashed it on the ground. To the wonder of the spectators, the vessel bent under the blow without breaking, and the ingenious artist immediately hammered out the bruise, and restored it whole and sound to its origi¬ nal form; in return for which display of his skill, Tiberius, it is said, ordered him to be immediately * xxxvi. 67. t h>. 66. 32 J POMPEII. put to death. The story is a strange one, yet it is confirmed by Pfiny, who both mentions the dis¬ covery itself, and gives a clue to the motives which may have urged the emperor to a cruelty apparently so unprovoked He speaks of ati artificer who had invented a method of making flexible glass, and adds, that Tiberius banished him lest this new faslyon should injure the workers in metal*, of whose trade the manufacture of gold, silver, and other drinking- cups, and other furniture for the table, formed an extensive and important branch. The Romans were also well acquainted with the art of colouring glass, as appears, among other proofs, from the glass mosaics, of which mention has been made. Pliny speaks of a blood-red sort, called hsematinon, from at/ta, blood; of white glass, blue glass, &c. The most valuable sort, however, was the colourless crystal glass, for two cups of which, with handles on each side (TTrepwra), Nero gave 6000 sestercest, about £i9. Under this head we may speak of the vases called ‘ murrhina,’ since one theory respecting them is, that they were made of Variegated glass. Their natui’e, however, is doubt¬ ful ; not so their value. Pliny speaks of 70 talents being given for one holding three sextarii, about four and a half pints. Titus Petronius on his death-bed defrauded the avarice of Nero, who had comjoelled him, by a common piece of tyranny, to appoint the crown his heir, by breaking a murrhine trulla, or flat bowl, worth 300 talents. Nero himself, as became a prince, outdid all, by giving 100 talents for a single capis, or drinking-cup, “ a memorable circumstance, that an emperor, and father of his country, should have drank at so dear a ratej.” Pliny’s description of this substance runs thus :— * xxxvi. 67. + xxxvi. 67. J Plin. Hist. Nat. xxxvii. 7. The cap.s, therefore, (so calletl DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE Otf ITALY. 33 “It is to be noticed, that we have these rich cas- sidoin* vessels (called in Latin murrhina) from the East; and that from places otherwise not greatly re- nowned, but most within the kingdom of Parthia • howbeit the principal come from Carmania. The stone whereof these vessels are made, is thought to be a certain humour, thickened, as it were, in the earth, by heat. In no place are these stones found larger than small tablements of pillars, or the like, and seldom were they so thick as to serve for such a drinking-cup as I have spoken of already. Re¬ splendent are they in some sort, but it may rather be termed a gloss, than a radiant and transparent clear¬ ness : but that which makeththem so much esteemed is the variety of colours; for in these stones a man shall perceive certain veins or spots, which, as they be turned about, resemble divers colours, inclining partly to purple, and partly to white: he shall see them also of a third colour composed of them both, resembling the flame of fire. Thus they pass from one to another as a man holdeth them, insomuch as their purple seemeth near akin to white, and their milky white to bear as much on the purplef. Some esteem those cassidoin, or murrhine stones, the richest, which present, as it were, certain reverbera¬ tions of sundry colours, meeting altogether about their edges and extremities, such as we observe in rain¬ bows : others are delighted with certain fatty spots appearing in them ; and no account is made of them which show either pale or transparent in any part ot them, for these be reckoned great faults and blemishes. In like manner, if there be seen in the cassidoin any spots like corns of salt, or warts, for then are they a capiendo, because it had handles,) must have been niuciS smaller than the trulla. * Chalcedony—it is thus that Holland interprets the word. f Purpura candescente, aut lacte rubescente. 34 POMPEII, considered apt to split. Finally, the cassidoin stones are commended in some sort also for the smell that they do yield*.” On these words of Pliny, a great dispute has arisen. Some think that onyx is the material described, a conjecture founded on the variety of colours which that stone presents. To this it is objected, that onyx and mnrrha, onyx vases and murrhine vases, are alike mentioned by Latin writers, and never with any hint as to their identity; nay, there is a passage in which Heliogabalus is said to have onyx and mur¬ rhine vases in constant usef. Others, as we have said, think that they were variegated glass ; others that they were the true Chinese porcelain, a con¬ jecture in some degree strengthened by a line of Propertius: “Murrheaq: in Parthis pocula cocta focis.” At the same time this quotation is not so con¬ clusive as it might have been, since Pliny speaks of murrha as “ hardened in the earth by heatand the poet may only have meant the same thing ; though the expression in that case would be somewhat strained. To us, Pliny’s description appears to point clearly to some opaline substance; the precious opal has never, in modern times, been found in masses approaching to the size necessary to make vessels such as we have spoken of. The question is not likely to be settled ; and it is not improbable that the material of these murrhine vases is entirely unknown to us, as the quarries of many marbles used by the ancients have hitherto eluded our re¬ search, and the marbles themselves are only known by their recurrence among ancient buildings. • Holland’s Pliny, xxxvii. 2. (8th edit., Valpy.) f Heliogabalus in murrhinis et onychinis minxit.—Lampri* Jius, ap. Montfaucon, vol. v. DOMtSSTIC architecture of ITALY. 35 We may here notice one or two facts connected with glass, which show that the ancients were on the verge of making one or two very important discoveries in physical science. They were acquainted with the power of transparent spherical bodies to produce heat by the transmission of light, though not with the manner in which that heat was generated, by the concentration of the solar rays. Pliny mentions the fact, that hollow glass balls filled with water would, when held opposite to the sun, grow hot enough to burn any cloth they touched*; but the turn of his expression evidently leads to the con¬ clusion that he believed the heat to become accu¬ mulated in the glass itself, not merely to be trans¬ mitted through it. Seneca speaks of similar glass balls, which magnified minute objects to the viewj Nay, he had nearly stumbled on a more remarkable discovery, the composition of light, for he mentions the possibility of producing an artificial rainbow by the use of an angular glass rodj. At a far earlier * Plin. xxxvi. 67. Cum adclita aqua vitrese piles sole adverse in tantum excandescunt ut vestes exurant. T But though he had observed the fact, he had not even ap¬ proached to the cause of it, for he refers the magnifying pow'er solely to the water, in common with all other fluids, and evidently supposes that a plane surface would magnify as well as a spherical one. “Illud adjiciam, omnia per aquam videntibus longe esse majora. Literae quamvis minutae et obscurae, per vitream pilam aqua pletiam majores clarioresq: cernuntur.Si poculum impleveris aqua et in id conjeceris annulum . . cum in ipso fundo jaceat annulus, facies ejus in summo aquae redditur. Quidquid videtur per humorem, longe ampliusvero est.”—Quaest. Nat. i. 6. “ Virgula solet fieri vitrea, stricta, seu pluribus angulis in modum clavee torosa: haec si ex adverse solem accepit, colorem talem qualis in arcu videri solet, reddit.” He goes on to say that this is because it tries to give an image of the Sun, but cannot manage it, “ quia enormiter facta est,” because it is irregularly made, “si apte fabricata foret, totidem redderet soles, quot habuisset infecturas,” if it were fitly made it would give as many suns, as it does colours.—Ib. 7. 36 POMPEII. period Aristophanes speaks of the “ ha\o9, a trans¬ parent substance used to light fires with,” usually translated glass. The passage is curious, as it shows a perfect acquaintance with the use of the burning glass. Strepsiades .—You have noted A pretty toy, a trinket in the sliops. Which being rightly held, produces fire From things combustible. Socrates. A burning glass Vulgarly called. Strep. You are right, ’tis so. Soc. Proceed. Strep .—Put now the case—your scoundrel bailiff comes, Shows me his writ—I, standing thus, d’ye mark me. In the sun’s stream, measuring my distance, guide My focus to a point upon his writ. And off it goes, in fumo*! With the laws of reflection, the ancients, as we know from the performances ascribed to Archimedes, were well acquainted : it is singular that, being in possession of such remarkable facts connected with refraction, they should never have proceeded to in vestigate the laws by which it is governed. Doric Cap'tal, cut in tufa and covered with coloured stucco. The stucco having partially fallen, the carving beneath it is shown, * Arist. Ns^. 766, ed. Brunck. 3f Chapter II. PAINTINGS ANB MOSAICS. The most remarkable objects with which the inte¬ riors of Pompeii reward the labour of excavation, are paintings and mosaics. Frequent mention of these branches of art will be made in the course of this volume, and it seems expedient therefore to collect in a prefatory chapter such information respecting them as has been gathered by the diligence of learned men either from personal observation, or from the scat¬ tered notices of ancient writers. The subject of working in mosaic will not occupy us long. The art is still exercised with success, at least equal to that of the Roman workmen, as is proved by the magnificent copies of some of the best pictures of Italian masters recently executed in the Vatican. The most remark¬ able circumstance connected with the practice of it in ancient times is the profusion with which mosaics were produced, insomuch that the dwellings of a second-rate town abound in specimens rich enough to be transferred to the palaces of Naples, and to be enumerated among their most precious ornaments. The expense of such works is now so great, that they are rarely to be seen even in palaces. voh. It. S 38 POMPEII The mosaics of Pompeii are chiefly composed of black frets, or meandering patterns, on a white ground, or white ones on a black ground : some of them, however, are executed in coloured marbles. We may refer to Mr. Donaldson’s work on Pompeii, which contains coloured drawings of several, for a better notion of these beautiful floors, than our means enable us to give. In the same work are contained the plans of eight others, all elegant,, and most of them intricate, taken from the Suburban villa; one of which is remarkable for being surrounded by a city wall with gates and towers; probably taken from that which then existed at Pompeii. The materials of which they are chiefly composed, are small pieces of black and white marble, and red tile, some larger than others, so as to take deeper hold m the mortar than the rest, and thus form a sort of bond¬ ing course, which gave stability to the whole. These were set in a very fine cement, laid upon a deep bed of mortar, which served as a base. 1 he history of their introduction and the method of pre¬ paring the foundation on which they were laid, are thus told by Pliny:— , , , i “ Painted floors* were firs used by the Greeks, who made and coloured them with much care, until they were driven out by the mosaic floors called lithostrota. The most famous workman in this kind was Sosus, who wrought at Pergamus the pavement which is called asarotus oikos, the unswept hall, made of quarrels or square tesserae of different colours, in such a way as to resemble the crumbs and scraps that fell from the table, and such-like things as usually are swept away, as if they were still left by neg i * These seem to have been merely floors made of stucco, and painted, like the sides of walls, of a single colour. It is not im¬ possible, however,but that they may have been painted in and with various colours, and that the idea of mosaics was from thence. PAINTINGS AND MOSAICS. 39 gence upon the pavement. There also is admirably represented a dove drinking, in such a way that the shadow of her head is cast on the water. Other doves are seen sitting on the brim of the vessel preening themselves and basking in the sun. The first paved floors which came into use were those called barbarica and subtegulanea, which were beaten down with rammers, as may be known by the name pavimentum, from pavire, to ram. The pavements called scalpturata were first introduced into Italy in the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, after the beginning of the third Punic war. But ere the Cimbric wars began, such pavements were in common use at Rome, and men took great delight and pleasure therein. “ For galleries and terraces open to the sky, they were devised by the Greeks, who, enjoying a warm climate, used to cover their houses with them: but where the rain-waters freeze, pavements of this sort are not to be trusted. To make a terrace of this sort, it is necessary to lay two courses of boards, one athwart the other, the ends of which ought to be nailed, that they should not twist nor warp; which done, take two parts of new rubbish, and one of tiles stamped to powder ; then with other three parts of old rubbish mix two parts of lime, and herewith lay a bed of a foot thickness, taking care to ram it hard together. Over this must be laid a bed of mortar, six fingers thick, and upon this middle couch, large paving-tiles, at least two fingers deep. This sort of pavement is to be made to rise to the centre in the proportion of one inch and a half to ten feet. Being thus laid, it is to be planed and polished diligently with some hard stone; but, above all, regard is to be had that the boarded floor be made of oak. As for such as do start or warp any way, they be thought nought. Moreover, it were better to lay a course of flint or chaff between it and the lime, to the end that the lime may not have so 40 POMPEII. much force to hurt the board underneath it. It were also well to put at the bottom a bed of round pebbles. “ And here I must not forg^et another kind of those pavements which are called Graeeaniea, the manner of which is this:—Upon a floor well beaten with rammers, is laid a bed of rubbish, or else broken tile-shards, and then upon it a couch of char¬ coal, well beaten, and driven close together, with sand, and lime, and small cinders, well mixed to¬ gether, to the thickness of half a foot, well levelled ; and this has the appearance of an earthen floor; but, if it be polished with a hard smooth stone, the whole pavement will seem all black. As for those pave¬ ments called lithostrota, which are made of divers coloured squares or dice, they came into use in Sylla’s time, who made one a-t Praeneste, in the temple of Fortune, which pavement remaineth to be seen at this day*.” It may be remarked here, that the Roman villa at Northleigh, in Oxfordshire, examined and described by Mr. Hakewill, abounded with beautiful pavements. The substratum of one of these, which had been broken, was investigated, when it was found that the natural soil had been removed to a depth of near seven feet, and the space filled up with materials which bear a near resemblance to those which Pliny recommends. The section is thus given by Mr. Hakewill :— ft. in. Plaster in which the tesserae are set.0 9 Stone pitching .0 9 Ashes and residue of burnt matter.I 3 Soil,&c.1 0 Rough stone rubble.1 0 Dirt, ashes, oyster-shells, broken pots, &c...t 9 Below this is the natural soil. A specimen of the coarser sort of mosaic pavement "■ Flin. xxxvi. PAINTINGS AND MOSAICS. 4] is to be seen in the Townley Gallery, in the British Museum. Some very remarkable mosaic pavements have been found in Pompeii, which may truly be called pictures in mosaic, and surpass in beauty any specimens which have been found elsewhere. One of these has been drawn and described in p. 245-6, vol. i.: it occupied the central compartment in the tablinum of the house of the tragic poet. Another was found in the house called the Villa of Cicero, POMPEII. 4i without the walls, in April, 1762 i which, the first and only picture of the kind which had then been brought to light, became a wonder to all who un¬ derstood ancient art, and could appreciate its merits; and was esteemed one of the most precious orna¬ ments of the royal collection. The picture repre sents a scene containing four masked figures, playing upon various instruments; a tambourine, cymbals, the double pipe, and the Pandean pipe ; a selection not unlike the equipment of a Pandean band in modern times. The drapery is elegant and well folded, and the whole composition is excellently grouped and drawn with precision. It is formed of very small pieces of glass, of the most beautiful colours, and of various shades. The hair, the small leaves which ornament the masks, and the eye¬ brows, are expressed so delicately as almost to escape observation. An additional curiosity is given to this valuable relic by the name of the painter, which is worked in it at the top, in black letters — AI02- K0YPIAH2.2AM102 EnOIH2E, Dioscorides of Samos wrought this. Winckelmann says that a good copy of this was found at Stabiae, in the year \lb9 *. Another, and a still more remarkable mosaic, has been recently discovered, which, if it really comes up to the description given of it, must be by far the most beautiful and magnificent specimen of this art which has yet been found. Professor Quaranta, who has written a descriptive essay upon it, supposes that the subject is the battle of Issus. We have not seen his work, but quote a few passages from a well-known periodical f. “ The extreme delicacy of this work on marble far surpasses the celebrated mosaic of Palestrina, as well as that of Hadrian’s villa, which have hitherto * Mus. Borb. vol. iv. pi. 34. t Literary Gazette, Feb. 25, 1832. PAl.'JTINGS AND MOSAICS. 43 been considered as the greatest wonders in this kind of work. Besides, what are four doves, some masks, and a few small figures, in comparison with a paint¬ ing in which are represented twelve horses, a large war-chariot, and twenty-two persons, more than half the natural size, without reckoning those that were on the left side, which is almost wholly destroyed? It is impossible to describe the consummate skill with which so many figures are arranged and grouped in this confined space, or the truth and correctness of the drawing, the distribution of light and shade, the effect of the colours, and scrupulous attention to the minutest accessories. Michael An¬ gelo* and Raphael might have been proud of the dying horseman ; and Alexander’s Bucephalus, the horses of the quadriga, the others that lie on the ground wounded, and especially the one rearing and fore-shortened, are drawn with a boldness and truth in their motions and positions which the greatest modern painters, Raphael not excepted, might envy.” Professor Quaranta supposes that the mosaic re¬ presents the battle of Issus, and brings passages from Diodorus and Quintus Curtius in support of his belief. The features of the figure said to be Alexander are reported to resemble the portraits of that monarch ; and the professor hazards a conjec¬ ture that, if in this head we recognize Alexander, that of Darius may also be his true portrait, which has hitherto been wholly unknown. “ When I first saw this masterpiece,” he adds, “ the heads of Darius and some of the Persians struck me so much, that I thought I had never seen anything so perfect; nay, that even the finest of Raphael’s could scarcely bear any comparison with them.” The subject of ancient painting will occupy a greater share of our attention. We shall not enter into any antiquarian discussions concerning the first 44 POMPEII. exercise of a faculty which seems almost as natural to man as the use of words ; nor attempt to give a history of ancient art, which would lead to a long digression little connected with Italian history, and not very edifying: for though Pliny has collected a vast quantity of amusing gossip relative to the Grecian painters and their most celebrated works, this, in losing its ditfuseness, would lose the best part of its meri.ts. Italy had no school of her own, except the Etruscan, which is entirely foreign to Pompefi, until she became the rendezvous of Grecian talent. The following account is chiefly taken from our constant guide, Mazois, verified, and in some instances corrected and enlarged, by reference tc? his originals, and to the researches of Sir Humphry Davy, concerning the colours employed by the an¬ cients in painting*. The custom of decorating walls with paintings may be traced to a most remote antiquity, without conceding all the claims of the Egyptians who pre¬ tend to have discovered it six thousand years before the Greeks. Without the parade of quoting autho¬ rities, recent discoveries, more especially those of Belzoni among the royal tombs, prove the existence of both drawing and colouring among that remark¬ able nation, many centuries before the birth of Christ. The art of portraiture was not unknown to the Jews, as we may infer from a passage in Ezekiel, xxiii. 14. Homer was acquainted with the effects produced by contrast of colours, both in the working of metals and in the labour of the loom qr needle: but we be¬ lieve he makes no mention of painting, except with respect to ships, which he calls “ vermilion-cheeked f.” The art of design is said to have been first introduced * Phil. Transactions, 1815. f Iv y^o 'K.vx.XaTritro’i vh; ’OvS’ avSjSf VJjaiv Iv/ rixrons. —Odyss. i, 125. PAINTINGS AND MOSAICS. 45 to Greece in Corinth ; and to have been transported from Greece to Italy. This, however, to say the least, is by no means certain. The Etruscan tombs and vases, found in such profusion, testify that at a very remote period the art of painting was cultivated among the Italian nations with zeal, and not without success. Pliny speaks of paintings in a temple at Ardea older than the foundation of Rome, and others of equal antiquity at Lanuvium and Caere; a date which, whether true or false, will at all events hardly command belief in the absence of all proof except the historian’s assertion. The first Grecian painters who came to Italy are said to have been brought over by Demaratus, the father ofTarquinius Priscus, king of Rome. At all events the influence which Etruria exercised over the arts at Rome during the reign of the Tarquins can hardly be questioned : and it is about this time, therefore, at which we m-ay fix the application of painting to purposes of internal and external decoration in that city. But the first recorded specimen of Roman art was not executed until near two hundred years later; when one of the noble tribe of Fabii painted the temple of the God¬ dess of Health, and obtained from his performance the surname, Pictor, a. u. 450. His performance commanded admiration in its day, and was to be seen until the temple was burnt in the reign of Claudius. The next artist mentioned by Pliny is Pacuvius, the poet, who, one hundred and fifty years later, amused his old age by painting the temple of Hercules in the Forum Boarium. Until the time of Augustus, however, it seems to have been usual only to paint the walls of houses one single colour, re lieved with capricious ornaments. That sovereign is said by Pliny to have been the first who thought ot covering whole walls with pictures and landscapes. In his time a painter named Ludius, invented that style of decoration which we now call arabesque, or 46 POMPEII, f^otesque. It spread rapidly, insomuch that the baths of Titus and Livia, the remains discovered at Cuma, Pozzuoli, Herculaneum, Stabiae, Pompeii, in short whatever buildings, about that date, have been found in good preservation, afford numerous and beautiful examples of it. Vitruvius was entirely out of conceit with this sort of ornament, and declares that such fanciful paintings as are not founded in truth cannot be beautiful: but the general voice, both in ancient and modern times, has pronounced a very different opinion. It was from the paintings found in the baths of Rome that Raphael derived the plan of those beautiful frescoes which have made celebrated the gallery of the Vatican: and other distinguished artists of the same era, the golden period of Italian art, followed in the path which he had struck out, until the public and private edifices of Italy were filled with these elegant and varied designs. This style derived its name of grotesque from the subter¬ ranean rooms (grotte), in which the originals were usually found ; rooms not built below the surface of the ground, but buried by the gradual accumulation of soil, and by the ruin of the lofty thermae of which they had formed a part. Herculaneum and Pompeii present as rich a mine for modern artists to draw from, as was possessed by the great masters of the Italian school ; and it is to be regretted that this method of decoration should not supersede the perish¬ able, and therefore not less expensive hangings of silk and paper in modern palaces. We may here mention a strange, and, as far as we know, unique method of painting, of which a few ex¬ amples are observable at Pompeii, which is descriljed as follows by Sir W. Gell: “ It is singular that in many cases, though a picture be not ill preserved, and may be seen from the most convenient distance, a style of painting has been adopted, which, though calculated to decorate the wall, is by no means in- PAINTINGS AND MOSAICS. 47 telligible on a nearer approach. In a chamber near the entrance of the Chalcidicum, by the statue ot Eumachia, is a picture, in which, from a certain dis¬ tance, a town, a tent, and something like a marriage ceremony might be perceived; but which vanished into an assemblage of apparently unmeaning blots, so as to entirely elude the skill of an artist, who was endeavouring to copy it at the distance of three or four feet. Another picture of the same kind is or was visible in the chamber of the Perseus and Andromeda. An entire farm-yard, with animals, a fountain, and a beggar, seemed to invite the antiouary to a closer inspection, which only produced confusion and dis¬ appointment, and proved that the picture could not be copied, except by a painter possessing the skill and touch of the original artist. It is probable that those who were in the habit of painting these unreal pictures, had the art of producing them with great ease and expedition; and that they served to fill a compartment, where greater detail was judged un¬ necessary*.” * “ This art of representing the effect of a picture upon a wall, instead of imitating nature itself, is applied with considerable success, in the decoration of certain modern Italian habitations. The author has seen in the Palazzo Sannizzi, at Rieti, a room of magnificent dimensions, on entering which a visitor imagines him¬ self in an apartment hung with green damask, and decorated with a profusion of splendid pictures. There are Madonnas and Holy Families, landscapes, animals, and battle pieces, which recall at the moment the names and works of the most distinguished artists. A further examination, on a nearer approach, shows that no 7»iT -1'.! I I i“r:Li_j--i ..x_.Lj_i_j_n.~». Ground-plan of a Shop. open, excepting in so far as it is occupied by a broad counter of masonry, into which are built four large jars of baked earth, their tops even with the surface of the counter. Behind are two small rooms, 5, 5, containing nothing of importance. The traces of a staircase, 4, indicate that there was an upper floor. At night the whole front was closed by shutters, sliding in grooves cut in the lintel and basement wall before the counter, and by the door, which in the view is thrown far back, so as to be hardly visible. There is an oven at the end of the counter farthest from the street, and three steps on the left side, which m the view have been presumed to support different sorts of vessels or measures for liquids. From these indications it is supposed to have been a cook’s shop ; for the sale, perhaps, both of undressed and dressed provisions, as is indicated in the view. The oven pro¬ bably served to prepare, and keep constantly hot, some popular dishes for the service of any chance cus¬ tomer ; the jars might hold oil, olives, or the fish- 82 POMPEII. pickle called garum, an article of the highest impor¬ tance in a Roman kitchen, for the manufacture of which Pompeii was celebrated *. Fixed vessels appear View of a Cook’s Shop restored. inconvenient for such uses on account of the difficulty of cleaning them out; but the practice, it is said, con¬ tinues to this day at Rome, where the small shop- * It was made of the entrails of fish macerated in brine. That made from the fish called scomber was the best. This word is sometimes translated a herring ; but the best authorities render it a mackerel. It was caught, according to Pliny, in the straits of Gibraltar, entering from the ocean, and was used for no purpose but to make garum. The best was called garum sociorum, a term of which we have seen no satisfactory explanation, and sold for 1000 sesterces for two congii, about £4 a gallon. An infe¬ rior kind, made from the anchovy (aphya), was called alec, a name also given to the dregs of garum. “ No liquid, except unguents,” Pliny says, “ fetched a higher price.”—Hist. Nat, xxxi. 43. ■Street view near the Baths PRIVATE HOUSES. 83 keepers keep their oil in similar jars, fixed iu a counter of masonry*. All the ornaments in the view are copied from Pompeii. In front of the shop are three stepping-stones, to enable persons to cross the road without wetting their feet in bad weather. The shop stands opposite the passa^i'e which leads behind the small theatre to the Soldier’s Quarters, or Forum Nundinarium; no bad , place for a cook’s shop, to whichever purpose the j square, thus doubly rramed, was applied. In the large map the counter will be seen to be laid down; but the ground-plan of the whole is not so perfectly made out as it has been by Mazois. In conjunction with a street view, we give the view of another shop, which has also a counter containing jars for the reception of some liquid commodity. By some it is called a Thermopolium, or shop for the sale of hot drinks, such as we have described a machine for making, in vol. i. p. 126. Others call it an oil- shop. In front is a fountain. It is situated at the angle of the street immediately adjoining to the house of Pansa, and, as may be seen by referring to the map, appears to be of greater extent, and to contain more conveniences than is usual in establishments of ■ this sort. The left-hand street leads to the gate of ; Herculaneum; the right, skirting Pansa’s house, is terminated by the city walls. Tracks of wheels are I very visible on the pavement. The interior was gaily i painted in blue panels and red borders, as we learn from the coloured view in Mr. Donaldson’s Pompeii, from which this is taken. The counter is faced and covered with marble. Numerous thermopolia have been discovered in Pompeii, many of them identified, or supposed to be identified, by the stains left upon the counters by wet glasses. The following engraving is the ground-plan of ^ * Mazois, p. 44. 84 POMPEII. another shop, affording much more accommodation, and, therefore, probably occupied by a more wealthy tradesman. 1. Entrance. 2. Shop. 3. Covered court, which, in a house of more pretension, would be called an atrium. It is pseudotetrastyle, the roof being sup¬ ported by four pillars, two of which are engaged in the wall. 4. Impluvium. 5. This room probably was the owner’s bed-chamber. 6. Staircase leading to one small room over the kitchen, 7. Part of the wall of the small upper chamber still remains. The columns PRIVATE HOUSES. 85 are perfect, and are painted red for the lower third of their height: the rest is white. It would be easy to multiply examples, but those already given are enough to convey a general notion of this class of houses : and there is little or nothing interesting in their details. We regret very much that the nature of the remains furnishes so little information with respect to the course of trade. Two remarkable buildings have been found, which will be described by themselves, and at length : one a bake-house ; the other an estab¬ lishment for fulling and dying cloth, of which we may conjecture that a considerable manufacture was here carried on, from the ample accommodation pro¬ vided for the dealers in that article, in the building called the Chalcidicum of Eumachia. With these ex¬ ceptions, and with one or two brief notices of articles found in different quarters, we can give no farther information connected with the trade of the place. Our next plan is that of a small house ; yet one superior to the last, both in accommodation and in the rank of its possessor. It was not inhabited by a shopkeeper, for there is no shop ; but its limited extent shows that the occupier was a person of nar¬ row income, probably either exercising some profes¬ sion, or living on a small independent property. Small as it is, it approaches more nearly in character to the superior class of houses than any yet described. 1. Entrance. 2. Passage. 3. Staircase leading to a small room, probably the master’s bed-chamber, and to a terrace extending over the length of the passage. 4. Small room for a servant. 5. Large room, perhaps serving at once for a kitchen and winter eating-room. Or the kitchen may be sup¬ posed to have been placed in the space 10, since the humble suppers of persons in this rank of life required no extensive preparation. 6. Court, or garden, half I 3 POyiPEIT, Hft Ground-plan of a small House. covered with a trellis, as is evident from the holt a which received the ends of the beams. It was meant to shade a stone triclinium, 9, (for the couches them¬ selves, as well as the room which contained them, were so named,) which still exists. 7. Canal to receive the rain-water, and conduct it into a cistern, from which it was drawn for household uses through a well-hole, 8. Cisterns of this sort were very care¬ fully made. The walls were lined with a strong PRIVATE HOUSES. 87 cement, made of five parts of sharp sand and two t)f quick-lime, mixed with flints ; the bottom being paved with the same, and the whole well beaten with an iron rammer. If it was wished to have the water perfectly pure, they did not content themselves with a single cistern, but made two or three at different levels, so that the water successively deposited the grosser and the lighter impurities with which it might be charged. Cistern water, when drunk, was usually boiled, to free it from any impure matters or smell which it might have contracted in the reservoir. It was not in high esteem, and was considered to make the voice of those who drank it hoarse and disagree¬ able. Such is the abundance of fountains in Pom¬ peii, that it probably was little used except for house¬ hold purposes. 11. Is a lararium, or domestic chapel, of very small dimensions, with a bench run¬ ning round two sides of it. In the centre is a small altar, placed before a niche, ornamented with the painting of some goddess holding a cornucopia. She is reposing on a couch, closely resembling a modern French bed. The mattress is white, striped with violet, and spotted with gold : the cushion is violet. Bed aud Table ; from a paiiuin^. 88 POMPEII. The tunic of the goddess is blue : the bed, the table, and the cornucopia, gold. This house stands just by the gate of Herculaneum, adjoining the broad flight of steps which leads up to the ramparts. It will be easily identified by its tri¬ clinium, on the large map of Pompeii in the Atlas published by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, to which we shall refer in future, to in¬ dicate the position of particular houses. Bonucci supposes that it belonged to the officer appointed to take charge of the gate and walls. We may take this opportunity to describe the nature and arrangement of the triclinium, of which such frequent mention has been made. In the earlier times of Rome men sat at table: the habit of reclining was introduced from Carthage after the Punic wars. At first these beds were clumsy in form, and covered with mattresses stuffed with rushes or straw. Hair and wool mattresses were introduced from Gaul at a later period, and were soon followed by cushions stuffed with feathers. At first these tri- cliniary beds were small, low, and round, and made of wood : afterwards, in the time of Augustus, square and highly ornamented couches came into fashion In the reign of Tiberius they began to be veneered with costly woods or tortoiseshell; and were covered with valuable embroideries, the richest of which came from Babylon, and cost incredible sums. Each couch contained three persons, and, properly, he whole arrangement consisted of three couches, so that the number at table did not exceed the number of the Muses ; and each person had his seat according to his rank and dignity. The places were thus appropriated:—1. The host. 2. His wife. 3. Guest. 4. Consular place, or place of honour. This was the most convenient situation at table, because he who occupied it, resting on his left arm, could easily with PRIVATE HOUSES. 89 Plan of a Triclinium, showing the disposition of the guests. his right reach any part of the table without incon¬ venience to his neighbours. It was therefore set apart for the person of highest rank. 5. 6. 7. 8, 9. Other guests. We may here introduce a picture, of a domes¬ tic supper-party. The young man reclining on the 90 POMPEII. couch is drinking from a horn pierced at the smaller end, so as to allow the wine to flow in a thin stream into his mouth. The female seated beside him stretches out her hand to a servant, to receive what appears to be her myrotheca, or box of perfumes. The table and the ground are strewed with flowers. The entertainment itself usually comprised three services; the first consisting of fresh eggs, olives, oysters, salad, and other light delicacies ; the second of made dishes, fish, and roast meats ; the third o^ pastry, confectionary, and fruits. A remarkable paint¬ ing, discovered at Pompeii, gives a curious idea of a complete feast. It represents a table set out with every requisite for a grand dinner. In the centre is a large dish, in which four peacocks are placed, one at each corner, forming a magnificent dome with their tails. All round are lobsters ; one holding in his claws a blue egg; a second an oyster; a third a stuffed rat; a fourth V little basket-full of grasshoppers. Four dishes of fish decorate the bottom, above which are several partridges, and hares, and squirrels, each hold¬ ing its head between its paws. The whole is sur¬ rounded by something resembling a German sausage; then comes a row of yolks of eggs; then a row of peaches, small melons, and cherries; and lastly, a row of vegetables of different sorts. The whole is covered with a sort of green coloured sauce*. Another house, also of the minor class, yet supe¬ rior to any hitherto described, is recommended to our' notice by the beauty of the paintings found. That the proprietor was not rich is evident from its limited extent and accommodation ; y^et he had some small property, as we may infer from the shop communi¬ cating with the house, in which were sold such articles of agricultural produce as were not required for the use of the family. 1. Prothyrum. 2. Atrium dis- pluviatum, a rare instance of this method of building * Donaldson PRIVATK HOUSES. 91 Ground-plan of a small House. That the apartment in question belonged to this class of atria is proved by holes in the outer wall, in which struts to support the projecting eaves were fixed; and also by the impluvium, 3, which has no issue to carry otf the water, being merely intended to receive the small quantity of rain which fell through the aperture ot the compluvium. And, not being exposed to the eayy drippings of the roof, the low wall round the impluvium is hollowed into little compartments, to be filled with earth and planted with flowers. 4. Well- hole communicating with a cistern under ground, o. atair. 6, 7. Apartments carefully decorated, but with nothn^ to fix their destination to any particular purpose. Probably the larger served as a triclinium. • Room, probably of the atriensis, the slave who had charge of the house. 9. Kitchen. 10. Shop. Ihis house was formerly decorated with paintings taken from the Odyssey, and from the elegant fic- mythology. When Mazois visited it n two paintings m the atrium were still in existence though in a very perishable state. Shortly copied them they fell, owing to the plas- ter detaching Itself from the wall. One of them is ^en from the Odyssey, and represents Ulysses and V^irce, at the moment when the hero, having drank 92 POMPEII. the charmed cup with impunity, by virtue of the anti- dote given him by Mercury, draws hi® sword and advances to avenge his companions . The gocldes^, terrified, makes her submission at once, as described by Homer, while her two attendants fly m alarm Fainting represenung aim vet one of them, with a natural curiosity, cannot resist the temptation to look back, and observe the termination of so unexpected a scene. Circe uses the very o-esture of supplication so constantly described by Homer and the tragedians, as she sinks on her own knees, extending one hand to clasp the knees o Ulvsses, with the other endeavouring to touch his beard t. This picture is remarkable, as teaching us * « ‘ Hence, seek the sty—there wallow with thy friends.’ She spake. 1 drawing from beside my thigh My faulchion keen, with death-denouncing looks Rushed on her; she with a shrill scream of tear Ran under my raised arm, seized fast my knees. And in winged accents plaintive thus began = ‘ Say, who art thou,’ &c.”—Cowper s Odyss. x. f She sat before him, clasped with her left hand His knees ; her right beneath his chin she placed, And thus the king, Saturnian Jove, implored.-ll. i. DUU PRIVATE HOUSES. 93 the oi-ig’iii of that ugly and unmeaning glory by which the heads of saints are often surrounded. The Italians borrowed it from the Greek artists of the lower empire, in whose paintings it generally has the appearance, as we believe, of a solid plate of gold. The glory round Circe’s head has the same character, the outer limb or circle being strongly defined, not shaded off, and dividing into rays, as we usually see it in the Italian school. This glory was called nimbus *, or aureola, and is defined by Servius to be “ the luminous fluid which encircles the heads of the gods.” It belongs with peculiar propriety to Circe, as the daughter of the sun. The emperors, with their usual modesty, assumed it as the mark of their divinity ; and, under this respectable patronage, it passed, like many other Pagan superstitions and customs, into the use of the church. The other picture represents Achilles at Scyros, where Thetis had hidden him among the daughters of Lycomedes, to prevent his engaging in the Tro- * Hence we may collect the true meaning of nimbus in the line— -Summas arces Tritonia Pallas Insedit, nitnbo effulgens, et Gorgone saeva.—Ain. xi. 615. Mazois continues, that sculptors, not having the resources of colour, and of light and shade, placed a solid disc about the heads of their statues to represent the nimbus, and that this was the ftnvlirxos, spoken of by Aristophanes, Aves, v. 1114, ed. Brunck. riv §£ fiii ^aXuiUt/rh finvio'xous &ii vfiiuii o; av //.rt 'inrat ^XatJ^a Xsvxtitj rors fidX/irf oureD S/xuv \uiriS iifitt, nrafft nroii h^tia’i xaTaTiXaftitoi, The explanation is plausible, and it seems more probable that the fi.miirx.of was used for this purpose, than that it was merely to protect the statue against the ill manners alluded to in the text, as the Scholiast says. But we are not aware that there is any positive evidence in its favour, or that any statues with the fjLmiffxoi have been found, though the aureola has frequently been observed on bas-reliefs, representing Apollo or Diana.—See Antiquitds d’Herculanum, vol. ii. p. 35. VOL. II. K 94 POMPEII. ian war. Ulysses discovered him by bringing for sale arms mixed with female trinkets, in the character of a merchant. The story is well known. The painting represents the moment when the young hero is seizing the arms. Deidamia seems not to know what to make of the matter, and tries to hold him back, while Ulysses is seen behind with his finger on his lips, closely observing all that passes. We will now take a house of a better class, yet still intermediate between those which we have been describing and the houses of the first class in Pom¬ peii; and there is none which will suit our purpose better than the Casa Carolina, as it is called, the House of Queen Caroline, so named because it was excavated in her presence. It will be found in the map, marked 49, in the more southerly of the two routes which lead from the Forum to the quarter of the Theatres. 1. Vestibule. 2. Corinthian atrium, a species of atrium of rare occurrence in Pompeii. The roof is supported by square pillars, painted with foliage, as if in imitation of climbing plants, placed upon a pluteum, or dwarf wall, which surrounds the implu- vium, or court rather, for there was a small basin in the centre for the reception of rain-water, which was further supplied by a fountain. 5. Kitchen, lighted bv windows to the street. 6, 7, 8, 12. Rooms for various purposes surrounding the atrium. Opposite to the prothyrum is the tablinum, 9, entirely open to the atrium as Vitruvius describes, but closed at the other end, which is not usual. 10. Ala, richly decorated with tasteful paintings, which, when Mazois wrote, were in perfect preservation. 11. Lararium, decorated as richly as the ala, and in the same taste. 13. Passage to another division of the house, which contains all the parts necessary for a small but sepa¬ rate establishment, and could have been made such by merely closing up the door of communication. PRIVATE HOUSES. 95 Str'eet. Plan of the Houae of Queen Caroline. It has, 14, its own entry; a court, 15 ; a kitchen, 18; and four rooms marked 17, for the various uses of the family. In the centre of the court, where we see the places of two pillars, destined apparently to sup¬ port a trellis, like that described in the former part of this chapter, there is a circular triclinium, if the expression is allowable, of masonry. This was pro¬ perly called stibadium *, as we learn, from Servius s definition of that word, that it is “ a semicircular bed suitable to a round table, which the Romans used instead of three beds, after tables made of citron wood * The diminutive of s’r/jSaj, a heel, from crtlliM, to tread ; pro¬ perly a bed of leaves and herbs. 96 POMPEII, came into general use*.” This sort of table was also called sigma, from its likeness to the Greek letter, as we learn from Martial, who also tells us how many persons it was meant to hold. Accipe lunata scriptum testudine sigma. Octo capil; veniat quisquis amicus erit.—xiv. 87. In another epigram he speaks of seven, as the num¬ ber which his sigma would hold. In the centre stood a round table on one foot, called thence mono- podivin. Several marble tables of this sort have been found during the course of the excavations. The paintings found here, described by Mazois as being in good preservation, have been so often wetted to refresh the colours for the gratification of visitors, that very few traces of them now remain. Two of them are engraved in Sir W. Gell’s Pompeii. The subject of one is doubtful \ it has been explained to be Diana and Endymion, or Venus and Adonis : the latter seems to be the most probable. It contains only three figures: a youth sitting down, whose head is encircled with rays of light, holding two spears ; a female figure of great beauty approaching him ; and between them Hymen, with his torch and a palm- branch. The female is rather scantily dressed, but richly ornamented with ear-rings, necklace, armlets, and bracelets. The other picture represents Perseus and Andromeda, after the hero has slain the monster. He holds behind him something like a skull, which is probably intended for Medusa s head, and his double- pointed sword, a very inconvenient looking weapon, lies beside him on the ground. Andromeda is in full costume, and wears a white tunic with a bluepeplum, or large wrapper. The ancient painters seem to have had no very wide choice of subjects. Almost all their serious compositions are mythological: and the desertion of Ariadne and the deliverance of An- * Serv. ap. i. 702. PRIVATE HOUSES, 57 dromeda recur so frequently at Pompeii that we may conclude these stories enjoyed a very extensive popu¬ larity. They were indeed well suited to that display of the human figure, in which the ancients took so much delight. In a neighbouring house is a beauti¬ ful painting of Venus and Adonis. His dogs lie at his feet, and a cupid, armed with two spears, stands beside him, bewailing the untimely fate of the young hunter. In the same house are several tasteful decorations, and among them marine horses engaged m a variety of gambols*. * (Jell. 98 POMPEII. Chapter V. HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST. The house which we are now about to describe is, in respect of regularity of plan and extent, the most re¬ markable contained within the walls. It was evidently the residence of one of the chief men of Pompeii, and from the words PANSAM . . painted in red near the principal entrance, has been usually deno¬ minated the House of Pansa. It is well observed, however, by Mazois, that the name being in the ac¬ cusative, this is evidently one of the laudatory inscrip¬ tions in honour of an tedile, or some other high officer, common in Pompeii; and that though the sedile Pansa is as likely to have lived here as any other person, there is no dependance on the correctness of the name thus given. We shall continue, however, for the sake oi clearness, to use the name under which it is generally known. Several inscriptions bearing the name of Cuspius Pansa, sedile, have been found. By reference to the map, in which it is marked 24, the reader will see that it occupies an entire insula, that is, it is completely surrounded by streets, in the centre of the town, in one of the best situations, close to the baths, and near the Forum. Including the garden, HOUSES OK PANSA AND SALLUST, 99 Plan of the House of Pansa. 100 POMPEII. which occupies a third of the whole length, the area on which it stands is about three hundred feet by one hundred: part of this, however, as is usual, is oc¬ cupied by shops belonging to the owner, and let out by him. 1. Protliyruni, paved with mosaic. 2.Tuscan atrium, 3. Impluvium, 4. Ala. 5. Open tabhnum, pa\ed with mosaic, serving as a passage to the peristyle, 8. There is also, however, a passage (fauces), 6, beside it, and though the tablinum was left open for the sake of the effect produced by thus making the length of the house visible at once, it was probably closed by a bronze or wooden railing, so as only to allow the master of the house, or the family, to pass through it. 7. The apartments on each side of the atrium, probably, were meant for the reception of guests, entitled to claim hospitality, who came to the house of Pansa when pleasure or business brought them to Pompeii. We have already stated, that when there was no hospitium, or separate building for the reception of such persons, it was customary to lodge them in the atrium, or public part of the house. The larger rooms, beside the tablinum marked 7, might serve for winter reception-rooms for clients, winter triclinia, or many other purposes, all equally probable and equally uncertain. 9. Open court. 10. Private entrance to the peristyle*. H- Basin. 12. Bed-chambers. The centre one seems to have been a procaeton, or ante-room, since it communi¬ cates with the one beyond it. 13. Is called by Donaldson the library; by Mazois, a pantry, or room to arrange the dishes before they were introduced into 14, the triclinium. 15. Winter cecus, or tricli¬ nium; Donaldson calls this room the lararium. 16. Large summer cecus. We may call this a cyzi- * The use of such a passage to a great man is obvious ^ --Rebus omissis Atria servantem postico falle clientem.—Hor. Ep. i. v. JO HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST, 101 cene oecus, or hall, since it exactly corresponds with the definition of this sort of apartment given in p. 17, in its spaciousness, its northern aspect, and its laro-e opening to the garden. 17. Fauces leading from the peristyle to the garden, to avoid making a pas¬ sage room of the oecus. 18. Kitchen. 19. Servants’ I hall, with a back door to the street. 20. Cabinet, looking to the garden. 21. Portico of two stories; a clear indication that this house had at least one upper floor. The staircase, however, has so entirely perished that its site is unknown, although there is some indication of one in the passage (26). 22. Garden: in one corner, 27, is a reservoir supplyinff a tank, 28. i / 6 Hitherto we have been exclusively concerned with the private house of Pansa : but the insula contains a j good deal, which was not in his own occupation, I and which indeed, we may conjecture, produced him I a handsome rental. 23. Four shops, let out to tenants. 24. Shop belonging to the house. Intended for the sale of the spare agricultural produce of the owner s estates. A slave named dispensator had the charge of it. The produce of the farms of the modern Italian nobles is still vended in the same way, in a small room on the ground-floor of their palaces! 25, 29. Two baking establishments. 23. Baker’s shop! 26. Entrance to the peristyle from the side street. On the pier, between the two doors, is a painting repre¬ senting one of the guardian serpents, of which we shall speak fully in describing the house of Sallust, by the side of which is a projecting brick, to receive a lamp lighted in honour of the Dii Custodes. This painting, from its situation, can only be seen by persons within the house ; but, on the opposite wall, there is a cross worked in bas-relief, upon a panel of white stucco, in such a way as to be visible to all passers. On this symbol, Mazois has founded a conjecture that the owner of the shop may have been a Christian, 102 POMPEII. His words are to the following purport: “ Though the first Christians have represented this symbol of Christianity under the form of a Greek, or equibrachial cross, and the limbs of this cross are of unequal length, I cannot bring myself to see merely some unknown instrument in it, as many persons have done, to whom I have shown this drawing of it. In truth, it ficult not to recognize it in the Latin cross, which would be nothing extraordinary, since Pompeii was not destroyed till the first year of the reign of Titus. But if it be a cross, how can we explain the juxtapo¬ sition, the mixture of this symbol of a new and pure religion with the images and practices of one ot the most absurd superstitions of antiquity ? It is hard to conceive that the same man could at once bow betore the cross of Christ, and pay homage to Janus, Ferculus, Limentinus, Cardia, the deities ot the thresholds and the hinges of doors; still more that he should adore it in combination with that emblem of an incomprehensible worship, which is close at hand *. Perhaps at this time the cross was a myste¬ rious hieroglyphic of meaning unknown, except ^ those who had embraced the Christian faith; which, placed here among the symbols of paga.nism as if m testimony of gratitude, informed the faithful that the truth had here found an asylum with a poor man, under the safeguard of all the popular superstitions f- On the probability of this conjecture we shall otter no opinion, leaving it to the decision of those who aie best acquainted with the minutiie of religious his¬ tory. If admitted, it would carry the use of the cross to an earlier period than any, we believe, to which it has yet been traced. . The ground-plan will indicate the disposition ot the rest of the bakery. In the centre of the large apart- * Above the aperture of the oven in bas-relief: below are the words, ** Hie habitat fclicitas,’ \ Maz. part ii. p. 84. HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST, 103 ment, 28, are three mills, c, a, a, and near theni, a large table, d. Flankiirg the entrance to the oven are three large vases, e, and in the left-hand corner is a knead¬ ing-trough, c, with two coppers placed over furnaces. The apartment, 31, from its communication both with the shop and the bakery, was probably used as a store¬ room. Viesv of tlie Euirauic lo iiiu House of Pausa. 104 POMI’KII, The two compartments marked 30 are houses of a very mean class, having formerly an upper story. Behind the last of them is a court, which gives light to one of the chambers of Pansa’s house. On the other side of the island are two houses (32), small, but of much more respectable extent and accommodation, which probably were also meant to be let. Or we might conjecture that one or both served as hospitia. Our view of this house is taken from a front of the doorway. It offers to the eye, successively, the doorway, the prothyrum, the atrium, with its implu- vium, the Ionic peristyle, and the garden wall, with Vesuvius in the distance. The entrance is decorated with two pilasters of the Corinthian order. Besides the outer door, there was another at the end of the prothyrum, to secure the atrium against too early intrusion. The latter apartment was paved with marble, rvith a gentle inclination towards the implu- vium. Through the tablinum the peristyle is seen, with two of its Ionic capitals still remaining. The columns are sixteen in number, fluted, except for about one-third of theii height from the bottom. They are made of a volcanic stone, and, with their capitals, are of good execution. But at some period subsequent to the erection of the house, probably after the earthquake, a. d. 63, they have been covered with a hard stucco, and large leaves of the same material set under the volutes, so as to transform them into a sort of pseudo-Corinthian, or Composite order. It is not impossible that the exclusively Italian order, which we call Composite, may have originated in a similar caprice. Of the disposition of the garden, which occupied the open part of the peristyle, we have little to say. Probably it was planted with choice flowers. Slabs of marble were placed at the angles to receive the drippings of the roof, which were conducted by metal conduits into tlie central basin, which is about six feet in depth, HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST. 105 and was painted green. In the centre of it there stood a jet d’eau, as there are indications enough to prove*. This apartment, if such it may be called, was unusually spacious, measuring about sixty-five feet by fifty. The height of the columns was equal to the width of the colonnade, about sixteen feet. Their unfluted part is painted yellow, the rest is coated with white stucco. The floor is elevated two steps above the level of the tablinum. A curious religious painting was found in the kitchen, representing the worship offered to the Lares, under whose protection and custody the pro¬ visions, and all the cooking utensils, were placed. In the centre is a sacrifice in honour of those deities, who are represented below in the usual form of two huge serpents brooding over an altar. There is something remarkable in the upper figures, of which Mazois, from whom our engraving is copied, has given no explanation The female figure in the centre * Donaldson. VOL. 11, L 106 POMPKII. holds a cornucopia; and each of the male figures holds a small vase in the hand nearer to the altar, and a horn in the other. All the faces, in his engraving', are quite black, and the heads of the male figures are surrounded with something resembling a glory. Their dress in general, and especially their boots, which are just like the Hungarian boots now worn on the stage, appear different from anything which is to be met with elsewhere. Are these figures meant for the Lares themselves ? On each side are represented different sorts of eatables. On the left a bunch of small birds, a string of fish, a boar with a girth about his body, and a magnificently curling tail, and a few loaves, or cakes rather, the precise pattern of some which have been found in Pompeii: on the right, an eel spitted on a wire, a ham, a boar’s head, and a joint of meat, which, as pig-meat seems to have been in request here, we may conjecture to be a loin of pork ; at least it is as like that as any¬ thing else. It is suspended by a reed, as is still done at Rome. The execution of this painting is coarse and careless in the extreme, yet there is a spirit and freedom of touch which has hit off the character of the objects represented, and forbids us to impute the negligence which is displayed to incapacity. Another object of in the Kitotienof the House of Tanea. HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST. 107 interest in the kitchen is a stove for stews and similar preparations, very much like those charcoal stoves which are seen in extensive kitchens in the present day. Before it lie a knife, a strainer, and a strange-looking sort of a frying-pan, with four spherical cavities, as if it were meant to cook eggs, A similar one, con¬ taining twenty-nine egg-holes, has been found ; which is circular, about fifteen inches in diameter, and without a handle. Another article of kitchen furniture is a sort of flat ladle pierced with holes, said to belong to A fiat Ladle called Tru i. the class called trua. It was meant apparently to stir up vegetables, &c. while boiling, and to strain off the water from them. This house has been long excavated ; and perhaps that is the reason that, considering its extent and splendour, the notices of it are particularly meagre. Of the decorations we have been able to procure no detailed accounts, though several paintings are said to have been found in it, and among them, one of Danae amid the golden shower, deserving of notice. Several skeletons, some of them recognized for females by their gold ear-rings, some vessels of silver, one of them a vase beautifully carved with bas-reliefs, others of bronze, glass, and terra-cotta, have been found in the island. Of the garden little can be said, for little is known. According to the best indications which Mazois could observe, it consisted of a number of straight parallel beds, divided by narrow paths which gave access to them, for horticultural purposes, but with no walk for air and exercise, except the portico which adjoins the house. 108 POMPEII. To give a better notion of the appearance and splendour of a Roman house, we conclude our account with a view of the interior, as it has been restored by the taste and learning of Mr. Gandy Dering in the first volume of ‘ Pompeiana,’ by whose permission a copy of the plate is here inserted. The view is ta.ken from the atrium, looking through the tablinum and peristyle, to the garden. The decorations are taken from indications still existing, which point out what had formerly been here, or from specimens preserved in other parts of Pompeii. The figures of the Muses are taken from paintings found on the walls of a house; the candelabra, tripods, &c. from articles preserved in the Neapolitan Museum. The doors on each side of the atrium gave access to the apartuients marked 7. Beyond them on each side are the alae, and in the centre the tablinum, all closed, or capable of being closed, hy parapetasmata, or curtains: for the use of doors for these large openings does not appear to have been general. Inferior to the house of Pansa, and to some others in size, but second to none in elegance of decoration and in the interest which it excites, is a house in the street leading from the gate of Herculaneum to the Forum, called by some the House of Actaeon, from a painting found in it; by others, the House of Caius Sallustius. It is remarkable that the architects of Pompeii seem to have been careless for the most part whether they built on a regular or an irregular area. The practice of surrouniling the owner’s abode with shops, enabled them to turn to advantage the sides and corners of any piece of ground, however mis¬ shapen. Thus in the plan before us the apartments of the dwelling-house are almost all well shaped, and rectangular, though not one of the four angles of the area is a right angle. 1. Prothyrum. 2. Large hall, serving as a vesti- Atriam of the Ho se of Paiisa houses of PANSA and SALLUST. 109 Ground-plan of the House of Sallust. bule, as is pretty obvious from its arrangement. In the comparatively humble edifices of Pompeii, the reader will not, of course, expect to find that splendid provision for the convenient reception of a crowd of importunate suitors, which we have described ^ in speaking of the palaces of Rome; still it is interesting to trace the same disposition of apartments on a smaller scale, especially as this throws some light upon the contested question of the Greek or Roman origin of the private houses. There are four doors; one opening to the prothyrum, another to the street, —a large opening, closed, according to Mazois, with quadrivalve doors, or doors folding back upon them¬ selves, like window-shutters. Of the otiier two, both 110 communicate with the atrium, one directly, the other through an intermediate room, 16, probably the cella the porter’s closet; so that at night, when the doors of the atrium were closed, no one could enter without his knowledge. 3. Shop communicating with the house for the sale of the produce of the pro¬ prietor’s estates. Jars, like those before described, are seen set in the counter, probably to receive his oil or olives. 4. Shop. .'i. Shop called a Thermopolium, with two rooms backwards. Between 4 and 5, in the party- wall, is the opening of a cistern, common to both. 6. Bakehouse. There were rooms over it, as is proved by a staircase. The four first steps, steep and incon¬ venient, were of stone, and consequently still remain. The sites of three mills a, a, a, are laid down. 7. Oven. 8, 9. Rooms belonging to the bakehouse. 10. Tuscan atrium. 11. Mar hie impluvium. 12. Ante-chamber of a large mens, or hall, 13, which perhaps was the winter triciinium. This conjecture is founded partly on its neighbourhood to the oven, which would keep it warm and dry, and in a comfortable state for win¬ ter use; partly from its size and sha})e. The length IS about twenty-four feet, the breadth twelve, which exactly agrees with the directions of Vitruvius, that the length of a triclinium should be double its breadth. A farther reason for thus appropriating it may be found in its central situation, which is such that it must have been very ill lighted, if lighted at all. It was probably, therefore, intended chiefly for evening use. 14, 15. Rooms probably for the reception of strangers, which, where there was no hospitium, generally were placed round the atrium. The walls of 15 are pre¬ served up to the cornice, and are elegantly stuccoed and painted. 17. Aim. That on the right opens into a cabinet, probably that of the airiensis. To corre¬ spond with the doorway, there was in the other ala a false doorway, which .served as a lararium, as the View ot ilie Jintraoce to the Houoe of sailusl HOUSES OP PANSA AND SALLUST 111 painting’s which were found in it prove. 18. Open room and staircase leading to a winter apartment placed above the oven. 19. Tablinum. 20. Fauces. 21. Portico. 22. Summer triclinium. 23. Cabinet. 24. Garden, or xystus. 25. Triclinium in the open air, covered by a trellis. 26. Kitchen. 27. Back entrance. 28. Chamber. 29. Entrance to venereum. SO. Lodge for a slave whose duty was to keep the door and prevent intrusion. 31, 32. Portico and court of the venereum. 33, 34. Cabinets opening from the portico. 35. Triclinium. 36. Open space containing a stove, and staircase to the terrace above the portico. Our general view of this house is taken from the street in front, and runs completely through to the garden wall. One of the pilasters which flank the doorway has its capital still in good preservation. It is cut out of grey lava, and represents a Silenus and Faun side by side, each holding one end of an empty leather bottle, thrown over their shoulders. Orna¬ ments of this character, which can be comprehended under none of the orders of architecture, are common in Pompeii, and far from unpleasing in their effect, how¬ ever contrary to established principles. On the right is the large opening into the vestibule. I n the centre of the view is the atrium, easily recognized by the im- pluvium, and beyond it through the tablinum are seen the pillars of the portico. Beyond the impluvium, is the place of a small altar for the worship of the Lares. A bronze hind, through the mouth of which a stream of water flowed, formerly stood in the centre of the basin. It bore a figure of Hercules upon its back. The walls of the atrium and tablinum are curiously stuccoed, in large raised panels, with deep channels between them, the panels being painted of different colours, strongly contrasted with each other. We find among them different shades of the same colour, seve¬ ral reds for instance, as sinopis, cinnabar, and others. 112 POMPEII. This sort of decoration has caused some persons to call this the house of a colour-seller; a conjecture entirely at variance with the luxury and elegance which reigii in it. The floor was of red cement, with bits of white marble imbedded in it. The altar in the atrium, and the little oratory in the left-hand ala, belong to the worship of the Lares domestici ox familiares ; as is indicated by the paint- ino-s found in the false doorway. They consist ot a serpent below, and a group of four figures above, employed in celebrating a sacrifice to these gods, in the centre is a tripod, into which a priest, his head covered, is pouring the contents of a patera. On each side are two young men, dressed alike, ap¬ parently in the praetexta, at least their robes are white and there is a double red stripe down the front ot their tunics, and a red drapery is thown over the shoulder of each. In one hand each holds a patera; in the other each holds aloft a cow’s horn perforated at the small end, through which a stream is spouting into the patera at a considerable distance. Ihis, though an inconvenient, seems to have been a com¬ mon drinking-vessel. The method of using it has already been described. In the back-ground is a man playing on the double flute. The worship of the Lares was thus publicly re¬ presented, and their images were exposed to view, that all persons might have an opportunity of sa¬ luting them and invoking prosperity on the house. Noble families had also a place of domestic worship (adytum or penetrale) in the most retired part of their mansions, where their most valuable records and hereditary memorials were preserved. The worship of these little deities (^Du minuti, or patel- larii*) was universally popular, partly perhaps on ♦Dii patellarii, idem ac Lares; sic vocati, quia non a potu modo in focum, qui Larium sedes, aliquid lis veteres defunderent, HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST. 113 account of its economical nature*, for they seem to have been satisfied with anything that came to hand, partly perhaps from a sort of feeling of good fellowship in them and towards them, like that con¬ nected with the Brownies and Cluricaunes, and other household goblins of northern extraction. Like those goblins they were represented sometimes under very grotesque forms. There is a bronze figure of one found at Herculaneum, and figured in the Antiquites d’Herculanum, plate xvii. vol. viii., which represents a little old man sitting on the ground with his knees up to his chin, a huge head, asses’ ears, a long beard, and a roguish face, which would not agree ill with our notion of a Brownie. Their statues were often placed behind the door, as having power to keep out all things hurtful, especially evil genii. Respected as they were, they sometimes met with rough treatment, and were kicked or cuffed, or thrown out at window without ceremony, if any un¬ lucky accident had chanced through their neglect. Sometimes they were imaged under the form of dogs, the emblems of fidelity and watchfulness, sometimes like their brethren of the highways (Lares compitales) in the shape of serpents. The tutelary genii of men or places, a class of beings closely allied to Lares, were supposed to manifest themselves in the same shape : as, for example, a sacred serpent was believed at Athens to keep watch in the temple of Athene in the Acropolis, Hence paintings of these animals became in some sort the custodians of the spot in sed ex cibis quoque in patella allquid ad focum deferrent.— Schol. in Pers., iii. 26. Oportet bonum civeni legibus parere et decs colere, in pa¬ tella dare K^iotg, i. e. parum carnis.—Varr. apud Non. 15, 6. Facciolati. *0 pai'vi, nostrique Lares, quos thure minuto Aut farre, et tenui soleo exorare corona.—Juv. ix« 137 POMPEII. 1 14 which they were set up, like images of saints in Roman Catholic countries ; and not unfrequently were employed when it was wished to secure any place from irreverent treatment*. From these associations the presence of serpents came to be considered of good omen, and by a natural conse¬ quence they were kept (a harmless sort of course) in the houses, where they nestled about the altars, and came out like dogs or cats to be patted by the visitors, and beg for something to eatf. Nay, at table, if we may build upon insulated passages, they crept about the cups of the g-uests, and in hot weather, ladies would use them as live boas, and twist them round their necks, for the sake of coolness J. Martial, however, our authority for this, seems to con¬ sider it as an odd taste §. Virgil, therefore, in a fine passage, in which he has availed himself of the divine nature attributed to serpents, is only describing a scene which he may often have witnessed:— “ Scarce had he finished, when with speckled pride, A serpent from the tomb began to glide ; His hugy bulk on seven high volumes rolled ; Blue was his breadth of back, but streaked with scaly gold : Thus, riding on his curls, he seemed to pass A rolling fire along, and singe the grass. More various colours through his body run. Than Iris, when her bow imbibes the sun. Betwixt the rising altars, and around, The rolling monster shot along the ground. *Pinge duos angues: pueri, sacer est locus —extra Meiite.—Pers. i. 113. + Erat ei (Tiberio) in oblectamentis serpens draco, quern e consuetudine manu sua cibaturus, cum consumptum a formicis invenisset, raonitus est ut vim multitudinis timeret.—Suet. Tib. X. 72. I Repentes inter poc.ula sinusque innoxio lapsu dracones.— Senecade Ira, ii. 31. § Si geJidum nectit collo (ilacilla draconem.—Mart. vii. 87. HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST, ] 15 With harmless play amidst tne bowls he passed, And w'ith his lolling tongue assayed the taste : Thus fed with holy food, the wondrous guest Within the hollow tomb retired to rest. The pious prince, surprised at what he viewed, The funeral honours with more zeal renewed Doubtful if this the place’s genius were, Or guardian of his father’s sepulchre We may conjecture from the paintings, which bear a marked resemblance to each other, that these snakes were of considerable size, and of the same species; probably that called iEsculapius, which was brought from Epidaurus to Rome, with the worship of the god, and, as we are told by Pliny, was commonly fed in the houses of Rome. These sacred animals made war on the rats and mice, and thus kept down one species of vermin; but as they bore a charmed life, and no one laid violent hands on them, they multiplied so fast, that, like the monkeys of Benares, they became an intolerable nuisance. The frequent fires at Rome were the only things that kept them under f. Passing through the tablinum, we enter the portico of the xystus, or garden, a spot small in extent, but full of ornament and of beauty, though not that sort of beauty which the notion of a garden suggests to us. It is not larger than a London garden, the ob¬ ject of our continual ridicule : yet while the latter is ornamented only with one or two scraggy poplars, and a few gooseberry bushes, with many more thorns than leaves, the former is elegantly decorated by the hand of art, and set apart as the favourite retreat of festive pleasure. True it is that the climate of Italy suits out-of-door amusements better than our own, * Dryden_iEn. v. 84, 95. t Anguis iEsculapius Epidauro Romam advectus e.st, vu'goq. pascituret in domibus. Ac nisi incendiis semina exurerenlur, non esset foecunditati eorum resistere.—Plin. Hist Nat. xxix. 2‘2 116 POMPEII. and that Pompeii was not exposed to that plt^'ue of soot, which soon turns marble goddesses into chimney¬ sweepers. The portico is composed of columns, fluted and corded, the lower portion of them painted blue, without pedestals, yet approaching to the Roman rather than to the Grecian Doric. The entablature is gone. From the portico we ascend by three steps to the xystus. Its small extent, not exceeding, in its greatest dimensions, seventy feet by twenty, did not permit trees, hardly even shrubs, to be planted in it. The centre, therefore, was occupied by a pavement ; and on each side boxes filled with earth were ranged for flowers, while, to make amends for the want of real verdure, the whole wall opposite the portico is painted with trellises and fountains, and birds drinking from them ; and above, with thickets enriched and ornamented with numerous tribes of their winged inhabitants. The most interesting discoveries at Pompeii are those which throw light on, or confirm passages of ancient authors. Exactly the same style of ornament is described by Pliny the younger as existing in his Tuscan villa. “ Another cubiculum is adorned with sculptured marble for the height of the podium ; above which is a painting of trees, and birds sitting on them, not inferior in elegance to the marble itself. U nder it is a small fountain, and in the fountain a cup, round which the playing of several small water-pipes makes a most agreeable murmur At the end of this branch of the garden, which is shaped like an L, we see an interesting monument of the customs of pri¬ vate life. It is a summer triclinium, in plan like that which has been mentioned in the preceding chapter, but much more elegantly decorated. The couches are of masonry, intended to be covered with mattresses and rich tapestry, when the feast was to be held here ' *Plin. Ep. lib. v. 6. HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST. 117 the round table in the centre was of marble Above it was a trellis, as is shown by the square pillars in front, and the holes in the walls which enclose two sides of the triclinium. These walls are elegantly painted in panels, in the prevailing taste; but above the panelling there is a whimsical frieze, appropriate to the purpose of this little pavilion, consisting of all sorts of eatables which can be introduced at a feast. When Ma/.ois first saw it, the colours were fresh and beantilul; but when he wrote, after a lapse of ten years, it was already in decay, and ere now it has pro¬ bably disappeared, so perishable are all those beauties which cannot be protected from the inclemency of the weather by removal. In front a stream of water M 3 118 POMPBII pours into a basin from the wall, on which, half painted, half raised in relief, is a mimic fountain sur¬ mounted by a stag. Between the lountain and tn clinium, in a line between the two pilasters wb c supported the trellis, was a small altar, ^ due libations might be poured by the part>. In the other limb of the garden is a small fomace probably intended to keep water constantly hot for the use of those who preferred warm potations. U.u y the Romans drank their wine mixed with snow, and clarified through a strainer, of which there are man^ in the museum of Naples, curiously pierced in intri¬ cate patterns ; but those who were under med cal care were not always suffered to enjoy this luxury. Martial laments his being condemned by physician to drink no cold wine, and concludes with wishing that his enviers may have nothing but warm water At the other end of the garden, ^ the triclinium, was a cistern which collected the rain¬ waters, whence they were drawn for the use of t garden and of the house. There was also a cistern at the end of the portico next the triclinium. The several rooms to the left of the atrium offer nothing remarkable. On the right, however as will be evident upon inspecting the plan, a smte of apart¬ ments existed, carefully detached from the remamdCT of the house and communicating only with the atriu by a single passage. The disposition and the orna- inents of this portion of the house prove thatjt was a private venereum, a place, if not consecrated to the goddess from whom it derives its name, at least espe¬ cially devoted to her service. The strictest privacy has been studied in its arrangements : no building overlooks it; the only entrance is closed by two doors, both of which, we may conjecture, were never suffered to be open at once ; and beside them was the apa * vi. 86. Veneicom of the House of Salluit. HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST. 119 ment of a slave, whose duty was to act as porter, and prevemt intrusion. Passing the second door, the visi¬ tor foTind himself under a portico supported by octa¬ gonal columns, with a court or open area in the centre, and i n the middle of it a small basin. At each end of the portico is a small cabinet, with appropriate painti ngs : in one of them a painting of Venus, Mars, and Cupid, is conspicuous. They were paved with marblle, and the walls lined breast high with the same material. A niche in the cabinet nearest the tricliniium contained a small image, a gold vase, a gold coin, and twelve bronze medals of the reign of Vespasian ; and near this spot were found eight small bronze columns, which appear to have formed part of a bed. In the adjoining lane four skeletons were found, apparently a female attended by three slaves ; the tenant perhaps of this elegant apartment. Be¬ side her was a round plate of silver, which probably was ai mirror, together with several golden rings set with engraved stones, two ear-rings, and five bracelets of the same metal. Both cabinets had glazed win¬ dows *, which commanded a view of the court, and of each other : it is conjectured that they were pro¬ vided with curtains. The court itself presents no trace of pavement, and therefore probably served as a garden, planted perhaps with stimulating herbs, as the eruca, commonly translated, rocket. The opposite page contains a view of the interior, as restored by Mazois. The ground of the walls is black, a colour well calculated to set oflf doubtful complexions to the best advantage, while its sombre aspect is re¬ deemed by a profnsion of gold coloured ornament, in the most elegant taste. The columns were painted with the colour called sinopis Ponticum, a species of red ochre, of brilliant tint. Nearly all the wall of the court between the cabinets is occupied by a * Mazois, part ii. p. 77. POMPEII \‘2{i large painting- of Actseon, from which the house derives one of its names : on either side it is flanked by tlie representation of a statue on a high pedestal. The centre piece comprises a double action. In one part we see a rocky grotto, in which Diana was bathing, when the unwary hunter made his appear¬ ance above : in the other he is torn by his own dogs, a severe punishment tor an unintentional intrusion. The back-ground represents a wild and mountainous landscape. Possibly this picture was not placed here without its moral, and may intimate that an untimely visit was not likely to be well received. A p-ainted frieze, and other paintings on the walls, complete the decorations of the portico. The maxim, “ Sine Cerere et Baccho friget Venus, ’ was not forgotten. Ample provision was made for refreshment. The large apartment, 35, was a tricli¬ nium for the use of this portion of the house, where the place of the table, and of the beds which sur¬ rounded it on three sides, was marked by a mosaic pavement. Over the left-hand portico there was a terrace. The space marked 36 contained the stair which gave access to it, a stove connected probably with the service of the triclinium, and other conve¬ niences. This house also has been restored by Mr. Dering, by whose permission the accompanying plate has been inserted. In the centre of the view is seen the opening into the tablinum, which probably was only separated from the atrium by curtains (parapetus- mata), which might be drawn or undrawn at plea¬ sure. Through the tablinum the pillars of tlie pe- rist}le, and the fountain painted on the garden wall, arc seen. To the right of the tablinum is the fauces, and on each side of the atrium the alae are seen, partly shut off, like the tablinum, by handsome dra¬ peries. The nearer doors belong to chambers which Atrirnn of the House of Sailut,t. HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUS P. 121 Staircase, Stove, and Water-closet in the Venereum of the House of Sallust open into the atrium. Above the coloured courses of stucco blocks the walls are painted in the light, almost Chinese style of architecture which is so common, and a row of scenic masks fills the place of a cornice. The ceiling is richly fretted. The compluvium also was ornamented with a row of triangular tiles called antifixes, on which a mask or some other object was rnoulded in relief. Below, lions’ heads are placed along the cornice at intervals, forming spouts through which the water was discharged into the impluvium beiieath. Part of this cornice, found in the house of which we speak, is well deserving oui- notice, because it contains, within itself, specimens of three different epochs of art, at which we must suppose the house was first built, and subsequently repaired. It is made of a fine clay, with a lion’s head moulded upon it, well designed, and carefully finished. It is plain, therefore, that it Was not meant to be stuccoed, or the labour VOL. n. ^ 122 POMPEII. bestowed in its execution would have been, in grea* part, wasted. At a later period it has been coated over with the finest stucco, and additional enrichments and mouldings have been introduced, yet without injury to the design, or inferiority in the workmanship ; in¬ dicating that at the time of its execution the original simplicity of art had given way to a more enriched and elaborate style of ornament; yet without any perceptible decay, either in the taste of the designer, or the skill of the workman. Still later this elegant stucco cornice had been covered with a third coating of the coarsest materials, and of design and execu¬ tion most barbarous, when it is considered how fine a Part of he cornice of the Impluvium of the Atrium of the House of Sallust. model they had before their eyes. In the annexed section the three periods are distinguished by differ¬ ent shades. The original cornice is the darker, marked A ; the second coating is left white ; the thii'd and last is faintly shaded. This was painted, HOUSES OF PANSA AND SALLUST, 123 which neither of the two earlier cornices appear to have been. In the restoration the impluvium is sur¬ rounded with a mosaic border. This has disappeared, if ever there was one : but mosaics are frequently found in this situation, and it is therefore, at all events, an allowable liberty, to place them here in a house so distinguished for the richness and elegance c-f its decorations. Beside the impluvium stands a machine for heating water, and, at the same time, warming the room, if requisite, which is now in the Royal Museum. The high circular part, with the lid open, is a reservoir, communicating with the semi¬ circular piece, which is hollow, and had a spout to discharge the heated water. The three eagles placed on it are meant to support a kettle. The charcoal was contained in the square base. •’ainting:, representing th« manner of hanging a Picture .ngainet the wall. 124 POMPEII. Mosaic Pavement. Chapter VI. STREET OF HERCULANEUM. In the preceding chapters we have taken indiscrimi¬ nately from all quarters ot the town, houses of all classes, from the smallest to the most splendid, in the belief that such would be the best way of showing the gradations of wealth and comfort, the different styles of dwelling adopted by different classes of citizens, in proportion to their means. It would, however, be manifestly impossible so to classify all the houses which contain something worthy of description ; and we shall therefore adopt a topographical arrangement, as the simplest one; commencing where the visitor usually enters, at the gate of Herculaneum, and pro¬ ceeding in as regular order as circumstances will permit through the excavated part of the town, con¬ cluding at the quarter of the Theatres, beyond which there is nothing excavated except the amphitheatre. Most of the houses immediately about the gate appear to have been small inns or eating-houses, probably used chiefly by country people, who came ir to market, or by the lower order of travellers. Imme diately to the right of it, however, there is a dwelling of a better class, called the House of the Musician, from paintings of musical instruments which orna¬ mented the walls. Among these were the sistrum tnimpet, double flute, and others. Upon the right side of the street, however, the buildings soon improve, and in that quarter are situated some of the most x’e- STREET OF HERCULANEUM. 125 markable mansions, in respect of extent and construc¬ tion, which Pompeii affords. They stand in part upon tfie site of the walls which have been demolished upon this, the side next the port, for what purpose it is not very easy to say: not to make room for the growth of the city, for these houses stand at the very limit of the available ground, being partly built uj)on a steep rock, which fell abruptly down to the sea shore. Hence, besides the upper floors, which have perished, they consist each of tw'o or three stories, one below another, so that the apartments next the street are always on the highest level. Those who are familiar with the metropolis of Scotland will readily call to mind a similar mode of construc¬ tion very observable on the north side of the High- Street, where the ground-floor is sometimes situated about the middle of the house. One of the most remarkable of these houses is that marked 15 in the map, and usually called, from cer¬ tain indications which have been supposed to mark it out as such, the lodging-house of J ulius Polybius. It contains three stories; the first, level with the street, contains the public part of the house, the vestibule, atrium, and tablinum, which opens upon a spacious terrace. Beside these, is the peristyle and other pri¬ vate apartments ; at the back of which the terrace of which we have just spoken offers an agreeable walk for the whole breadth of the house, and forms the roof of a spacious set of apartments at a lower level, which are accessible either by a sloping passage from the street, running under the atrium, or by a staircase communicating with the peristyle. This floor con¬ tains baths, a triclinium, a spacious saloon, and other rooms necessary for the private use of a family. Behind these rooms is another’ terrace, which over¬ looks a spacious court, surrounded by porticoes, and containing a piscina, or reservoir, in the centre. The N 3 126 POMPEII. pillars on the side next the house are somewhat higher than on the other three sides, so as to give the terrace there a greater elevation. Below this second story there is yet a third, in part under ground, which con¬ tains another set of baths, and, besides apartments for other purposes, the lodging of the slaves. This was divided into little cells, scarcely the length of a man, dark and damp; and we cannot enter it without a lively feeling of the wretched state to which these beings were reduced. A few steps further, on the same side, is another house somewhat of the same description, which evi¬ dently belonged to some man of importance, probably to Julius Polybius, whose name has been found in several inscriptions. Fragments of richly gilt stucco¬ work enable us to estimate the richness of its deco¬ ration, and the probable wealth of its owner. It is marked 23, and will be readily distinguished by its immense Corinthian atrium, or rather peristyle. It has the farther peculiarity of having two vestibules, each communicating with the street and with the atrium ; a unique instance, so far as we are yet ac¬ quainted with Pompeii. The portico of the atrium is formed by arcades and piers, ornamented with at¬ tached columns ; the centre being occupied by a court and fountain. These arcades appear to have been enclosed by windows. Square holes, worked in the marble coping of a dwarf wall which surrounds the little court, were perfectly distinguishable *, and it is concluded that they were meant to receive the window- frames. Pliny the younger describes a similar glazed portico at his Laurentine villa; and an antique paint¬ ing, representing the baths of Faustina, gives the view of a portico, the apertures of which are entirely glazed, as we suppose them to have been here. The portico, and three apartments which communicate with it, were paved in mosaic. Attached to one of the corner j)iers * Mazoig. part ii. ' 52. STREET OF HERCULANEUM. 127 there is a fountain. The kitchen and other apartments were below this floor. There was also an upper story, as is clear from the remains of staircases. This house, the last which has been excavated on this side of the way, extends to the point at which an unexcavated bye street turns away from the main road to the Forum. We will now return to the gate, to describe the triangular island of houses which bounds the main street on the eastern side. That called the House of the Triclinium,_No. 9, de¬ rives its name from^ large "tnclrmu^ in the centre of the peristyle, which is spacious and handsome, and bounded by the city walls. This is called by Sir William Gell the House of the Vestals; a name ap¬ plied by the authorities from whic-h our map has been taken, to a house a little farther on, marked 11. What claim it has to this title, except by the rule of con¬ traries, we are at a toss to guess; seeing that the style of its decorations is very far from corresponding with that purity of thought and manners which we are accustomed to associate with the title of vestal. The paintings are numerous and beautiful, and the mosaics remarkably fine. Upon the threshold, here, as in several other houses, we find the word “ Salve,” Welcome, worked in mosaic. We enter by a vestibule, divided into three compartments, and ornamented with four attached columns, which introduces us to an atrium, fitted up in the usual manner, and sur¬ rounded by the usual apartments. The most re¬ markable of these is a triclinium, which formerly was richly paved with glass mosaics. Hence we pass into the private apartments, which are thus described by Bonucci:—“ This house seems to have been originally two separate houses, afterwards, probably, bought by some rich man, and thrown into one. After traversing a little court, around which are the sleeping chambers, and that destined to business, we hastened to rendei our visit (o the Penates. We en 128 POMPEII tered the pantry, and rendered back to the proprietors the greeting that, from the threshold of this mansion, they still direct to strangers. We next passed through the kitchen and its dependencies. The corn-mills seemed waiting for the accustomed hands to grind with them, after so many years of repose. Oil stand¬ ing in glass vessels, chesnuts, dates, raisins, and figs, in the next chamber, announce the provision for the approaching winter, and large amphorae of wine recall to us the consulate of Caesar and of Cicero. “We entered the private apartment. Magnificent porticoes are to be seen around it. Numerous beau¬ tiful columns covered with stucco, and with very fresh colours, surrounded a very agreeable garden, a pond, and a bath. Elegant paintings, delicate ornaments, stags, sphinxes, wild and fanciful flowers, everywhere cover the walls. The cabinets of young girls, and their toilets, with appropriate paintings, are disposed along the sides. In this last were found a great quantity of female ornaments, and the skeleton of a little dog. At the extremity is seen a semicircular room adorned with niches, and formerly with statues, mosaics, and marbles. An altar, on which the sacred fire burned perpetually, rose in the centre. This is the aacrariuin. In this secret and sacred place the most solemn and memorable days of the family were spent in rejoicing; and here, on birth-days, sacrifices were offered to J uno, or the Genius, the protector of the new-born child*.” The next house is called the House of a Surgeon, 16, because a variety of surgical instruments were found in it. In number they amounted to forty; some resembled instruments still in use, others are difterent from anything employed by modern surgeons. In many the description of Celsus is realized, as, for in- * Not having oeen able to procure Bonucci’s work, we quote from the notes to a little American story, entitled, ‘ The Vestal, a tale of Pompeii.’ STREET OF HERCULANEUM. 12!) stance, in the specillum, or probe, which is concave on one side and flat on the other; the scalper excisorius, in the shape of a lancet-point on one side, and of a mallet on the other; a hook and forceps, used in obstetrical practice. The latter are said to equal in the convenience and ingenuity of their construction the best efforts of modern cutlers. Needles, cutting- compasses (circini excisorii), and other instruments were found ; all of the purest brass with bronze han¬ dles, and usually enclosed in brass or box-wood cases. There is nothing remarkable in the house itself, which contains the usual apartments, atrium, peristyle, &c., except the paintings. These consist chiefly of archi¬ tectural designs; combinations of golden and bronze- coloured columns placed in perspective, surmounted by rich architraves, elaborate friezes, and decorated cornices, one order above another. Intermixed are arabesque ornaments, grotesque paintings, and com¬ partments with figures, all apparently employed in domestic occupations. Three of these we have se¬ lected for insertion. One of them represents a female figure carrying rolls of papyrus to a man who is seated and intently reading. ' The method of reading these rolls or volumes, which were written in trans¬ verse columns across the breadth of the papyrus, is clearly shown here. Behind him a young woman is 130 POMPKU. It IS a common practice at the present day in Italy, especially near Naples, to construct light treillages on the tops of the houses, where the inhabitants enjoy the evening breeze, al fresco, in the same way as in these paintings. The peristyle is small, but .n good preservation. Its intercolumniations are filled up by a dwarf wall painted red ; the lower part of the columns being painted blue. This house runs through the island from one street to the other. Adjoining it, on the south, is the custom-house, telonium. Here a wide entrance admits us into an ample chamber, where many scales, and among them a steelyard, stalera, was found, much resembling those now in use, but more richly and tastefully ornamented. A description of similar implements has been given in the first volume, p. 207-8. Many weights of lead and marble were found here; one with the inscription, ‘ Erne et habebis,’ (Buy and you shall have). Near the custom-house is a soap manufactory. In the first room were heaps of lime, the admirable quality of which has excited the wonder of modern plasterers STREET OF HERCULANEUM. 131 In an inner room are the soap-vats, placed on a leve with the ground. The island is terminated by the fountain, of which there is a view, vol. i. p. 131. We now come to the House of Actaeon, which oc- cupicii the whole breadth of an oblong insula, extend¬ ing backwards to the city walls. Of that house we need not uive any further description. Besides it, the island contains three houses which have been dis¬ tinguished by names, the House of Isis and Osiris, the House of Narcissus, and the House of the Fe¬ male Dancers. Of these the latter is remarkable for the beauty of the paintings which adorn its Tuscan atrium. Among them are four very elegant figures of female dancers, from which the name given to the house is taken. Another represents a figure reposing on the border of a clear lake, surrounded by villas and palaces, on the bosom of which a flock of ducks and wild-fowl are swimming. The house of Nar¬ cissus is distinguished by the elegance of its peristyle; the intercolumniations are filled up by a dwarf wall, which is hollowed at the top, probably to receive earth for the cultivation of select flowers. Our materials do not admit of a fuller description of the houses in this quarter. Passing onwards from the house of Actseon, the next island, separated from it by a narrow lane, affords nothing remarkable, except the shop of a baker, to the details of which, in conjunction with the art of dying, we purpose to devote a separate chapter It is terminated in a sharp point by the fountain, of which we have given a view, p. 83. The dis¬ position of the streets and houses everywhere is most unsymmetrical, but here it is remarkably so, even for Pompeii. Just by the house with the double vestibule, the main street divides into two, inclined to each other at a very acute angle, which form, together with a third cross street of more importance, another small triangular island. The !32 POMPHII, Fi(fuve from the House of the Female Danoert. STREET OF HERCULANEUM. 133 house at the vertex was an apothecary’s shop. A great many drugs, glasses, and phials of the most sin¬ gular forms, were found here : in some of the latter fluids were yet remaining. In particular one large glass vase is to be mentioned, capable of holding two gallons, in which was a gallon and a half of a reddish liquid, said to be balsam. On being opened, the con¬ tents began to evaporate very fast, and it was there¬ fore closed hermetically. About an inch in depth of the contents has been thus lost, leaving on the sides of the vessel a sediment, reaching up to the level to which it was formerly filled. The right-hand street leads to buildings entirely in ruins, the left-hand one conducts us to the Forum. Immediately to the eastward of the district just de¬ scribed, is the house of Pansa, which occupies a whole island. Between it and the city walls, on the north, is a considerable tract of unexcavated ground. Beyond, still to the east, is an island separated from it by a nar¬ row street, and bounded on the other side by the street of the Mercuries, which runs in a straight line from the walls nearly to the Forum. This island is one of the later, and most interesting excavations. It contains, besides several private houses of great beauty, the Ful- lonica, or establishment for the fulling and dying of woollen cloths. This, together with the bakehouse above-mentioned, will afford materials for a separate chapter. VOL. II. o 134 POMPKII. Antique Bas-relief in terra-cotta, representinj? a Mule attached to a Mil?,. Chapter VII. ART OF BAKING.—FULLONICA. The fame of an actor has been justly said to be of all fame the most perishable, because he leaves no memo¬ rial of his powers, except in the fading memories of the generation which has beheld him. An analogous proposition might be made with respect to the mechar nical arts: of all sorts of knowledge they are the most perishable, because the knowledge of them can¬ not be transmitted by mere description. Let any great convulsion of nature put an end to their practice for a generation or two, and though the scientific part of them may be preserved in books, the skill in mani¬ pulation, acquired by a long series of improvements, is lost. If Britain, bs destined to relapse into such a ART OF BAKING. 1S5 stale of barbarism as Italy passed through in the period which divides ancient and modern history, its inhabitants a thousand years hence will know little more of the manual processes of printing, dying, and the other arts which minister to our daily comfort, in spite of all the books which have been, and shall be written, than we know of the manual processes of an¬ cient Italy. We reckon, therefore, among the most interesting discoveries of Pompeii, those which r elate to the manner of conducting handicrafts; of which it is not too much to say that we know nothing, except through this medium. It is to be regretted, that as far as our information goes, there are but two trades on which any light has yet been thrown, those, namely, of the baker and the dyer. We shall devote this chap¬ ter to collecting what is known upon these subjects. Three bakers’ shops at least have been found, all in a tolerable state of preservation. The mills, the oven, the kneading-troughs, the vessels for containing water, flour, leaven, have all been discovered, and seem to leave nothing wanting to our knowledge : in some of the vessels the very flour remained, still capable of being identified, though reduced almost to a cinder. But in the centre some lumps of whitish matter re¬ sembling chalk remained, which, when wetted and placed on a red-hot iron, gave out the peculiar odour which flour thus treated emits. One of these shops was attached to the house of Sallust, the other to the house of Pansa: probably they were worth a handsome rent. The third, which we select for description, for one will serve perfectly as a type of the whole, seems to have belonged to a man of higher class, a sort of capitalist; for instead of renting a mere dependency of another man’s house, he lived in a tolerably good house of his own, of which the bakery forms a part. It stands next to the house of Sallust, on the south side, being divided from it only by a narrow street. POMPEII Its front is in the main street leading from the gate of Herculaneum to the Forum. Entering by a small vestibule, the visitor finds himself in a tetrastyle atrium (a thing not common at Pompeii), of ample dimensions considering’ the character of the house, being about thirty-six feet by thirty. The pillars which supported the ceiling are square and solid ; and their size, combined with indications observed in a fragment of the entablature, led Mazois to suppose that, instead of a roof, they had been surmounted by a terrace. The impluvium is marble. At the end of the atrium is what would be called a tablinum in the house of a man of family, through which we enter ART OF BAKING. iS7 the bakehouse, which is at the back of the house, an